Chapter Text
It’s just another day at work, when Kaidou’s life shatters.
He oversleeps, which means he sleeps until his alarm goes off at 5am. He gets up, and goes for a run, because he decided a long time ago that if he goes for a run at 5am, his life must be fine. Guys who run at 5am, even if they were up until 2 and are a little bit hungover, are not guys that don’t have it together.
It’s a disgusting day to run. Temperatures have been high all week, but the sticky-hot typhoon season kind of high, where it rains all night, then the water sits in the heat all day, making him feel sweaty before he’s gone more than two steps onto the road. Cicadas scream in the bamboo along the path where he runs, and no one is at the dog park on his route yet. That’s never a sign that it’s going to be a good day.
His phone buzzes once he gets home at 6.
Noguchi (work): Good morning! Can you cover my evening? Wife’s birthday, taking her out.
Kaidou: fine
Noguchi (work): Thanks. I’ll let the boss know.
The quick shower he takes gets rid of the gross sweaty feeling, a little. Noguchi’s shampoo falls on his foot, crowding the little shelf space in his unit bath.
He squeegees down the bathroom, then sweeps and mops the floor of his 1DK apartment, tearing off a new moisture capture pod, tossing the old wet one in the garbage. He weighs the likelihood of rain again today, and decides to chance it, hanging his futon out on the balcony to get some air and keep the mold away.
The remnants of last night’s beer and shochu make his tongue feel fuzzy no matter how many times he scrubs it with a toothbrush. He brushes his teeth again just to be sure, until he feels his gums stinging.
It’s a 10 minute jog to the train station, and four stops to the gym where he trains guys with more money than muscles. He’s not hungry, but there’s a protein bar in the bag he carries around his shoulder, and inspections are next week. Once a month, all of the training staff are measured and photographed, to make sure they’re maintaining a high standard of physiology. “The clients want to know they can look like you,” his boss always says, then grimaces when he sees Kaidou. “From the neck down, at least.”
It’s fine. The protein bar tastes like chalk, but it’s just calories, just like the job is just something that pays his bills. It’s not necessary to find joy in every little thing.
Arima behind the desk flutters her fingers in a wave when he gets in. She’s in university, working to pay for her classes, and he’d made the mistake of giving her the lunch he packed for himself once. Ever since, she’s played with her braid whenever she sees him, laid a hand on his arm whenever she’s talked to him, recommended him to new clients if she thinks they have money, and asked him out for karaoke with her friends. It doesn’t seem to matter that he always turns her down.
Names pop out at him unbidden on the client board. There’s a trainer who works afternoons called Kamio, and Kaidou was nervous at first, but he’s a guy in his sixties who’s come out of retirement to work a few days a week. He has a client called Hiyoshi, too, and there’s usually a Tachibana and a Fuji on the board somewhere, both of them making him start and wonder every time.
But they’re common names. The Kachirou who works in the office isn’t the boy that he trained with for years. They’re all just people, buried in their own lives the way he’s buried in his.
“Kaidou-san,” Arima calls quietly, then looks around, getting up from behind her desk to shuffle over to him. The gym logo is stretched over her chest, too wide. She leans close, enough that he can smell her toothpaste. “Kaidou-san, I have a new client for you this morning. I think it’s a good one. Can you take an 11:30?”
Kaidou tries not to sound too eager, and just jerks his head in a nod. A new client will keep Goto off his ass, if Kaidou can retain him.
That’s always the issue, though. No matter how many wealthy clients Arima slyly puts in front of him, they tend to use up the first trial package, then decide he’s too much work the first time he snarls at them for not holding up their end of the bargain, and quit, find another gym, or just fail to renew the training sessions. He’s got three clients who have stuck with him for more than six weeks, and one of them is about to leave the country. Goto, his bastard boss, has started making pointed remarks about retention being the most important part of their job, and about how all staff will have to show a minimum of three long-term clients at all times.
Best behavior. He can do this. As much as this is just a job, just a way of making enough money to keep him alive and send money to his parents, he still needs it, and job searching is the worst thing in the world. At least here, he knows what he can expect, and what’s expected of him.
11:30 rolls around, and finds him in the consultation office, waiting on the client. There’s no file - Arima usually gives him a client file before, with basic information and what the client is looking to achieve, but maybe he hadn’t filled it out properly yet. After a moment of hesitation and remembering Goto snapping at him, Kaidou takes off his sweatshirt, leaving him in a tank top and shorts. Goto is strict, about what the trainers are supposed to look like.
The door opens.
It isn’t enough of a warning, that Arima bobs her head and says, “Right here, Inui-san.”
Where could he possibly run, with only a second’s warning?
Dark eyes catch his from behind a familiar pair of square-framed glasses, and Kaidou’s world shatters.