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Even after all this time, Yuma still doesn't quite know what to feel. When the calls come to tell him he's needed in Tokyo, he's always excited to be going back, to be seeing all the friends he's made in Tokyo again, to be recording and rehearsing and performing, but he's always terribly disappointed, too. He doesn't like leaving all the friends he has in Kansai, doesn't like feeling like he's betraying them by running off to do things without them, but he loves rejoining his group in Tokyo. They always make him feel welcome in Tokyo, completely at home and a treasured guest at the same time, and the joyful greetings he gets every time he returns home never get old. He loves and hates the travelling he has to do in perfectly equal measures, and one day, when the call comes through mid-rehearsal and Shigeoka approaches him with a sombre look on his face, Yuma thinks he might be at the end of his tether.
"We miss you when you're gone, you know," Shigeoka says softly, and Yuma feels his heart break a little. He doesn't know what to say so he just nods and can't quite meet Shigeoka's eyes.
"I'm sorry," he says eventually, and Shige frowns. Before his friend can say anything though, there's an arm being slung around his shoulders and Yuma finds himself face-to-face with Ryusei. Ryusei must be crouching for him.
"What are you sorry for, idiot?" Ryusei asks with a grin, although the question is entirely rhetorical, "Don't be stupid."
Another sudden weight around his neck makes Yuma stumble, and it's Kamiyama's laughter he hears against his ear. "Absence makes the heart grow fonder, right?" he says, and Yuma can hear the cheeky smirk in his voice, "If you stick around too much, we probably wouldn't like you any more. Gotta get rid of you now and again, y'know!"
Yuma laughs and flails an arm around in an attempt to whack Kami anywhere he can reach. "See if I bring you back anything this time, ass."
It takes the combined strength of Take, Non-chan, Gakki and Shige to remove Ryusei and Kamiyama from Yuma's body - who could do little more than flail his hands around rather uselessly once the two of them really got hold of him - and when he's finally free again, it's Shige who notices the dejected way Yuma collects up his things.
"It's not a bad thing, you know," he says, keeping his voice low so that the others can't butt in again, "You going off to Tokyo. Nobody minds."
Yuma smiles a small, half-hearted quirk of the lips, and Shige nudges him with a sharp elbow.
"It's exciting, all this attention you're getting! You totally deserve it too, we all think so. We miss you when you're gone, but nobody begrudges you going and doing everything you're getting to do. Just make sure you bring some of those Tokyo fans back for us too, 'kay?"
Yuma's smile is much more genuine this time, and he feels his chest swell with gratitude.
"Thanks," he murmurs. He wants to say so much more, but he's never been very good with words - being a seventeen-year-old boy has never helped much with that either - so he just nudges Shige back, and grins back when his friend flashes bright white teeth in his direction, eyes crinkling at the corners.
"Thanks," Yuma says again. And he means it.