YNoMH? (BL)

Off Air - Vol. 2 Story 4.2

Off Air – Vol. 2 Story 4.2

Story 4: Other Short Stories – Part 2

Translator Note: This part contain ficlets written for "Daydream Believer" from Off Air Volume 1.

Dreams of Love

(Note: This short story contains references to the short story "Daydream Believer" from Off Air Volume 1 and the spinoff "Side Profiles and Irises.")

He had thought that he had seen a lot of sides of Kei and a fair number of sides of Kunieda-san, but this particular Kunieda-san was unusually rare—a first he'd ever seen of him, in fact. Kunieda-san was on The News as always, at the same time as always, just calmly reading the sports news like nothing was wrong, and Ushio uttered a "Huh?" without thinking. Kunieda-san had already read the news for the regular news segments; it couldn't be that the producers decided to switch up their roles.

What happened? Did Minagawa catch a cold or something? But still, weren't there other announcers besides Kunieda-san who could step in and pinch hit for him? Ushio just hoped that nothing serious happened, like he had fainted or had gotten into an accident before the broadcast. He was worried as he watched Kunieda-san's sports news segment, but it went smoothly, and he did an excellent job.

"Why were you doing the sports news tonight?" Ushio asked when Kei arrived home.

Kei scowled and answered, "Because that moron ruined his throat, having too much fun at karaoke. Can you believe that? Argh, I want to kill him."

"Ohhh, so it wasn't anything too serious, I'm glad. And you were able to pay him back for everything he did for you."

"I don't owe him anything."

Okay, now that I have that off my mind, let's watch it again... Ushio reached for the remote to try to replay The News, but Kei stole it from him.

"Why are you watching it!?"

"Well, I was too worried about Minagawa, so I couldn't focus on the show."

"Don't waste your energy worrying about that useless thing, and pay attention when you watch the show!"

"So which one do you want me to do? Want to eat dinner?"

"Yeah."

Ushio heated some canned sardines in oil in a frying pan and placed them on top of rice with julienned perilla leaves and grated radish. To flavor it, he added soy sauce and plenty of sudachi lime.

"But anyway, so Kunieda-san also has a command on sports, huh?"

"You didn't pay attention, did you?"

"I said that I watched it."

Kei was like a Russian nesting doll who hid lots of different Kunieda-sans inside of him, but it was pretty surprising to see a new one show up out of the blue. Like Ushio had never expected to see this type of pattern. With one presenter down, regardless of the camera work or the news or the discussion, Ushio would think that the show would feel more samey, but this new variation of Kunieda-san easily made up for Tatsuki's absence. Ushio probably wasn't the only one who thought that he was amazing.

"More."

Kei held out the empty rice bowl that he finished in a blink of an eye.

"You can sure eat."

"I'm exhausted from all the extra work I was forced to do!"

"Ohhh, okay, okay."

Ushio decided for the second helping, he would make a fragrant chabushi soup ochazuke, pouring green tea over rice with miso, bonito flakes, and a mountain of green onions.