Miracle by Hane Shinohara

Sometimes there were days when they didn’t need miracles.

Sometimes, not often but sometimes, the roads were well maintained and pothole free. Sometimes the sun overheard was merely a pleasant heat on their backs, rather than desert glaring and torturous. And sometimes, rarely, the youkai didn’t bother them, and they didn’t bother the youkai, and they passed each other by without a word.

Sometimes the towns were full of happy, accommodating people who lived happy, accommodating lives out in the middle of nowhere and did not bow to Buddhism, thank you, and cared not a whit that Sanzo was a high ranking monk. For them, not understanding or noticing the trappings of robe and sutra, Sanzo was just a pretty face and a foul mouth and a charge card. And his companions just companions, not slaves, not disciples, not youkai on a mission to murder their way West.

It was nice to be anonymous.

Sometimes the nights were peaceful with mahjong and liquor and cricket song outside their open window. Sometimes Goku forgot to order everything on the menu, trying to tell a story over dinner, and sometimes Sanzo forgot to crack the boy over the head with the harisen for talking with his mouth full. Sometimes Hakkai got a chance to cook and Gojyo would saunter into the kitchen unannounced afterwards and because it wasn’t expected of him, would elbow Hakkai aside and finish the dishes. Gojyo usually had an ulterior motive for that, however.

It was nice to know someone thought you deserved compensation for living.

Sometimes they were forced to camp out in the woods and Gojyo made up absurd ghost stories about women in white nightdresses and black hair who lived in mirrors, or lakes, or an unlucky person’s bedroom. Sanzo would pretend not to notice Goku shifting closer until the monkey was tucked at his side, wide eyed and pale but utterly adamant that Gojyo’s pitiful attempts at scaring him were not working. Sometimes the heat of the fire made Sanzo lazy enough to not retaliate when a diademed brow drooped onto his shoulder and the boy in question fell asleep right there. Sometimes, waking in the cold night in a tangle of blankets, one of them would find four bodies curled together unconsciously, heat seeking heat, and there would only be a smile or a brushing of fingers across someone’s cheek before sinking back down in contentment.

Sometimes the alcohol was good and the girls pretty and the sex probably fantastic, but Gojyo would show back up at the door of their rented room without conquest in his eyes and his pants still belted, and Hakkai’s empty smiles would be just a little bit warmer. Sometimes all of the above applied and sex was fantastic, except Gojyo had never left in the first place and the monkey was asleep and oblivious in the next room over.

It was nice to think that everything one could want was right inside a single room.

Sometimes Hakkai would bait Sanzo over literature they both knew each other had read, and Sanzo would pretend not to have an opinion until he got a bit drunk and then he’d bite Hakkai’s head off for presuming that great scribe so-and-so had any idea of what he was talking about when he’d written his masterpiece. And Hakkai would look innocent and confess incomprehension and Sanzo would launch into lengthy recourse and then the green eyed youkai would puncture his argument with needling logic. They could go back and forth until Sanzo reached the end of his inebriated patience and stilled the man’s debating tongue the best way he knew how. Hakkai usually didn’t mind losing these little contests. Or maybe Sanzo was the one who lost. Or maybe neither. They both won something in the end, after all.

Sometimes it was the stupid things. The little things. Someone tripping over nothing on a flat surface while trying to make a grand point. Someone deciding that people who stayed clear of shallow, playful streams on hot days deserved a karmic soaking. Someone absently reaching out for a beer or a cup of tea and someone else just as absently handing it to them without eye contact. Someone trying to use Hakuryuu as a cigarette lighter.

It was nice to know that small bits of Heaven could exist easily on earth, and that was why there were days when they had absolutely no use for miracles.