Yashoku by Trismegistus

     夜色
     by Trismegistus

     It's close to midnight and you've been thinking about going home for at least an hour, but his face is flushed with drinking and laughing and you're afraid that if you try to speak to him now, he might not hear you.

     He's flirting shamelessly with three separate women, so shamelessly, in fact, that they don't even notice that his hand hasn't left your thigh since you sat down next to him. He's drunk, but his opponents are drunker yet, and you smile to yourself as you watch him cheat them with barely-concealed glee, brazenly palming counters from the man to his right, stacking the deck so he's dealt a blackjack every other hand.

     His hand creeps further up your leg and you put one of your own over it in warning. He erupts into laughter over something the bartender's said; everyone else laughs along, but only you realise that his amusement is entirely for your sake. You don't even need to look at his face any more to see it; the warm, golden glow of his ki is all the evidence you need. You weave your fingers into his and his ki glows brighter still, threatening to eclipse the harsh izakaya lighting.

     It keeps growing brighter, and suddenly you find yourself very suspicious. But before you're able to voice your suspicions in a suitably benign fashion, he squeezes your hand, and then the table goes crashing into the far wall, cards, drinks, and cigarette butts flying in every direction.

     Oh honestly, you think.

     Standing across from you, nostrils flaring like a bull's, is the man who has been Gojyou's fiercest competition for the duration of the evening.

     "You fucking son of a bitch!" he roars. "You've got half a deck palmed! I saw you do it! I saw him do it!" he exhorts the other patrons, who are watching from the sidelines in various states of drunken bemusement.

     "Aww, come on now," says Gojyou. "No one likes a sore loser..."

     "He's got them! He's got them palmed! I swear, you fucker, you've got them palmed, I'm going to kill you, you--"

     "Hey, hey, hey, settle down everyone." The master emerges from behind the bar, raising a pair of placating hands.

     "Yeah, Banji, come on man, you're way drunk. Settle down."

     The crowd seems, on the whole, to agree with the mediator's sentiment, and you begin to hope against your better judgment that things may yet turn out all right.

     Most of the crowd seems to agree, but not all of them - one of the other players is eyeing Banji, a spark of interest slowly taking light in in his eyes.

     "He did win an awful lot of times," the man slurs thickly, and you suddenly realise that it's time to go home for the night, after all. You hustle Gojyou out through the crowd, tossing apologies and genial laughter over your shoulder as you go.

     The two of you spill out onto the street and stand for a moment, breath steaming in the wintry air as you gain your bearings. You look him up and down as he stands, red hair dyed redder still by the light of the lanterns, and raise an eyebrow.

     "Thought you might've been ready to get going," he says by way of explanation, his grin twisting the faded lines of his scars across his cheek.

     "I do appreciate your thoughtfulness," you tell him, "but might I suggest that you need not provide it in such an...exciting...manner?"

     "Aw, now what kinda person would I be if I didn't keep you entertained?" he asks.

     You laugh, despite yourself. Some things haven't changed at all, not even after all these decades. "Shall we go?" you ask, glancing at the izakaya door, which threatens to disgorge angry gamblers at any moment.

     "That was the idea from the beginning, remember?" he says, and then you both head off down the street toward home. It's winter, and a mild one at that, so the streets are fairly crowded even at this late hour, and you find yourself waving and calling greetings at regular intervals until you're well out of the village and onto the mountain road.

     The woods are soft with the scent of resin and the sighing of the wind through the boughs overhead. An animal crashes through the underbrush somewhere up ahead. You both pause, listening intently, and the forest seems to listen back.

     It's dark here, with the trees to block the moonlight and the snow, but the darkness poses no problem to your keen eyesight, and you move through the woods as quickly as you would in broad daylight, Gojyou following in your wake.

     Finally the wood thins and you break through into the open land beyond, the smooth white expanse of rice paddies gone fallow stretching away into the distance. The light of the moon on the snow is blinding; Gojyou throws a hand over his eyes and even you are forced to squint a little.

     "Man, that's pretty," Gojyou murmurs.

     You walk for awhile in silence, snow crunching under your boots. Gojyou huffs a little as he walks; it's hard going through two feet of unpacked snow, and Gojyou's smoked like a chimney for most of his life. But your pace is leisurely as it is; slowing down any further would just annoy him.

     A set of rabbit tracks crosses your path, then a set of fox prints, and finally the tracks of a pack of wild dogs, leading toward one of the abandoned farmhouses that line the road in intervals. The world is at peace once again, but it's far from fully healed, even twenty-odd years after the lifting of the minus wave.

     The path turns and skirts around the foot of another mountain. One more pass, and a gentle one at that, and you'll be back home. Through unspoken agreement you both pause for a moment to rest, looking back out over the fields through which you've come.

     The moonlight lights the snow with the brilliance of diamonds, the darker trail of your footprints winding back towards the wood. The warmth of his fingers sends a pleasant chill down your spine as he traces them up and down the length of your long, pointed ear.

     "Didn't feel like being human today?" he asks, fingers pausing briefly over the indentations made by the long years of wearing limiters.

     You shrug. "I am a youkai, as well. It's helpful to remind myself sometimes."

     "Ah, well," he says, tosses his hair over one shoulder, and lights a cigarette. You're not certain, but you think you've seen some strands of silver among the scarlet, but then again it may just be a trick of the moonlight.

     He takes a long, contemplative puff, the smoke trailing from his nostrils rising to blend with the steam of your breath. "You make a good one." The fingers trace the twist of vines down your cheek and neck, and it occurs to you that he's tracing their path without looking, though he's rarely seen you in this form.

     You turn to face him, open your mouth to reply, but he puts a finger to your lips. He takes your hand in his and traces the vines that wind along that as well, and this time you know he doesn't need to look to do it, because his eyes never leave your face.

     It still comes as a shock, sometimes, to see the crows feet at their corners, the wrinkles that are becoming faintly visible around his mouth. He shouldn't look this old, not before he reaches fifty, but then he hasn't exactly led an easy life.

     You're struck by a sudden, irrational embarrassment, as if he's somehow caught you without your clothes on. Which is ridiculous, because he has seen you without your clothes on, and doubtlessly will again tonight. Still, the feeling persists, all the same.

     His lips are soft and warm, and you think you can taste melting snowflakes on their touch. Your hands move of their own accord, down his shoulders, his back, a thumb tracks the curve of a cheek. After thirty years, you know his body as if it were your own.

     An owl hoots softly from somewhere in the woods.

     "Time to head home?" he asks.

     You nod and walk slowly down the path, matching one another stride for stride.