Tightrope (part 2)

[krystalkatzfics]

Title: Tightrope

Author: krystalkatz
Rating: G(for this part)
Length: chaptered
Genre: Au,

Pairings: Ohno Satoshi/Aiba Masaki,   Matsumoto Jun/Ninomiya Kazunari

Disclaimer: I only own the plot

“Niji…Up” Nino said patting his shoulders and the tiger lifted himself onto his back legs putting his front paws on the magician’s shoulders. Aiba couldn’t help but be impressed at how well the tiger was trained but he still couldn’t understand the name ‘Rainbow’. He had been living and working here for over a week and slowly he was getting used to how things were going. Even Matsu wasn’t as bad as he thought as long as he didn’t get too friendly with Nino.

The other members of the circus had also started to trust him a little more the only one he was still having problems with was Ohno, for reason only known to himself the trapeze artist treated him like he was the scum of the earth. Aiba tried not to let it bother him but being glared at almost every day hurt. Nino had told him just to ignore it that he treated everybody else just the same, but Aiba still wished there was a way he could change it. He blinked coming back to his senses, Nino and Niji were doing a few more tricks and every time Nino said the tigers name he felt like giggling.

“Why Niji?” He asked in the end and Nino gave a laugh as the tiger flopped down with a small thud going to his basket.

“We’re in a circus… Kids are here so we have to be careful… Plus Jun named him…” The magician said with a shrug.

“So have you always been in the circus?”

“Yep… Conceived and born in the same caravan…” Nino nodded and then added quickly “Not the one me and Jun are living in… We got our own three months ago… When it became obvious that we were more interested in each other than any girls…”

“And everyone just accepted it?”

“Hell no… but at the end of the day even if we’re all not related by blood we’re all family and you support your family” Nino shrugged as he started sweeping the tigers cage “Besides Jun is the only trapeze artist that can keep up with that psychotic arsehole Ohno so when Jun threatened to leave they asked us to stay and we got the new caravan…”

“You and Ohno-san really don’t get on do you?” Aiba said glad it wasn’t only just him.

“Nope… He is well and truly dangerous… Anyway enough chitchat, we have a real show tonight and I haven’t even started rehearsing properly…” The magician said calling Niji over to him and leaving the animal cages. “I’ll see you later”

“Yeah…” Aiba said looking around at the cages he still had to clean, the animals of the circus were all remarkably well looked after, he had learnt not to cut corners when caring for them, not that he would anyway. The two elephants of the circus were still a bit wary of him but the rest of the animals were lovely and he was enjoying himself so much while looking after them. He grabbed his shovel and started to work as he heard the sounds of people rehearsing looking up he could just make out the gymnastic poles. He stared in wonder as he saw two figures starting to do tricks, even if they were both scary they were talented he thought.

He had just finished scrapping out a zebra’s cage when it happened, he was in his own little world dreaming about a hot shower when he found himself falling forwards and landing on something pleasantly soft and warm. Opening his eyes he was horrified to the little trapeze artist giving him daggers.

 “You stink… Get off me…” Ohno said pushing at his shoulders

“I was just clearing out poop” Aiba said stupidly and Ohno shot him a sideways glance

“And you decided to attack the star of the show?” Ohno asked sleepily “Was this Nino’s plan…”

“Plan? I just tripped…” Aiba said as he quickly pulled himself up off of the surly trapeze artist

“So you’re clumsy as well as an idiot?” Ohno mumbled and Aiba was surprised that there wasn’t much malice in his voice, if anything he sounded bored with the whole thing. He’s eyes though were another story, under the sleepy lids his eyes were blazing fire

“I’m not an idiot…” Aiba replied trying to defend himself and not think ‘wow he’s really cute this close too’

“Just clumsy? That’s all we need a clumsy animal tamer” Ohno said quietly rolling his eyes and walking away and Aiba was positive he heard something like “I don’t know why Sakurai does this… the circus is going under and he still picks up runaways”

The circus was going under? Aiba thought looking around not knowing what he was meant to be looking for in a failing circus, Nino didn’t mention anything like that. He chewed his lips he looked around for the magician but only found Matsu coming towards him, his shirt off and sweat creeping down his body.

“You okay?” he asked wiping his face with the shirt in his hand.

“Yeah… Where’s Nino?” Aiba asked wishing he hadn’t when Matsu eyes narrowed suspiciously

“Why?”

“I just wanted to talk to him!” Aiba said quickly wondering if the trapeze artist was like this with everyone or if he was just lucky.

“He’ll be rehearsing with Niji…” Matsu answered “You shouldn’t disturb them unless you have to…”

“I see… Um…” Aiba said before quickly saying goodbye and running to the caravan he was sharing with Sakurai, to grab his towel, feeling completely miserable. He had thought he was fitting in but now he didn’t think that was the case.

“Hey, Aiba-chan” Sakurai said looking up from some paperwork as he came in “Is everything okay?”

“Y-yeah” He lied, he didn’t want to complain, like Nino said these people were all family and he was just an outsider.

“Was it Ohno or Jun?” Sakurai asked as Aiba tried to find his towel and body soap.

“Huh?”

“That upset you…”

“I accidently knocked Ohno-san down…” Aiba admitted looking down at the body wash in his hands

“I bet he wasn’t happy ne” Sakurai said sympathetically and Aiba nodded

“I’m sorry”

“Don’t worry about it too much when he finds out Nino will give you an award” Sakurai grinned patting his shoulder and Aiba giggled

“They really don’t seem to like each other…”

“Hmm they used too… Growing up, Nino was always clinging to him… There were rumours about them…”

“So what happened?”

“About four months ago Ohno and Jun were attempting to do a triple backwards jump… It was only in rehearsal so the safety net was in place but… Nino would say that Ohno pushed Jun to far…  Jun said it was his fault either way Jun fell… If it wasn’t for the safety net…” Sakurai didn’t finish that sentence but Aiba could easily picture what he meant “Before then nobody even knew Nino and Jun even liked each other let alone were dating” Sakurai laughed “After that everybody knew…”

“And Ohno-san and Nino fell out…”

“I’m sure there were other reasons but I think that’s the main reason that Nino gets mad if Ohno’s name is even mentioned… Ohno though he’s a good guy once you get to know him and in his own way he cares about this circus and everybody in it which will include you…”

“I doubt it I’m just an outsider…” he muttered darkly thinking about Ohno’s attitude towards him. Sakurai smiled understandingly patting his shoulder

“Give it a few weeks… Anyway, you should take that shower this will be your first real show tonight you should enjoy it…”

“I’m allowed to watch it?” Aiba cried not caring if he suddenly sounded like a five year old. He had only ever been to the circus once in his life before and that was a long time ago with his grandma.

“If you’ve done all your jobs and you’re on hand… Most of the acts will handle their own animals during the actual show but you’ll be there for support… So shower…”

Aiba grabbed his stuff and ran out of the trailer his grumpiness forgotten as he headed to the shower block. He had gotten used to the shared showers by now and he was disturbed when he realised he wasn’t alone. The screen blocked him from seeing who it was though.

“It’s a magical song…” he sang to himself as he stepped under the lukewarm water and quickly soaping himself, not wanting to waste water as Sakurai had warned him that they had a water storage unit that had to run everything in the camp. Aiba kind of liked the way it was set up, like although they had their own caravans and trailers everybody was living in a big house.  “It's a magical song… The beginning is always a discotique, discotique, Whimsical nights　Easy come, easy go…”

“So I can add singing to the things you’re bad at?” A voice said and Aiba turned still washing his chest. His face immediately went red as he saw that Ohno was standing behind him water droplets running down his, beautiful well-toned body. He wasn’t wearing a towel and even after how nasty the trapeze artist was to him he was having serious difficulty in keeping his eyes on the smaller guys face.  “So are you watching the show…”

“No I wasn’t looking!” The animal trainer said quickly his cheeks going bright red and to his amazement Ohno actually laughed and grabbed a towel

“Watch me tonight” He said before walking off and leaving Aiba to wonder if he had split personality or something. One thing was certain, he thought as he washed his hair Ohno was actually really hot.

TBC

A/N: I hope you enjoy ^.^