Winter’s chill only proves one’s existence…
The Drinking Game
A current owner.
A former secretary.
A jar of saké.
It took a while to get the knots right, but then, Oriya has a lot of experience.
“Thank you very much for your assistance, Mibu-san,” Tatsumi bows his head gracefully as he sits across from Oriya, palms flat on the tatami mat floor.
“Not at all,” Oriya says smoothly, his emptied long-stemmed kiseru pipe in one hand. The folds of his kimono spread around him like the petals of some exotic bloom, ever more strange for it being found in winter. It is indigo shot through with silver threads in a thick weave, ideal for winter if one stays indoors.
“Yet without your assistance, our work would be that much harder,” Tatsumi says, as shadows pool before him. He dips his hands into the seething black mass, and pulls out a clay-sealed jar. “Please let me give you a gift, as a token of my esteem.”
Oriya raises an eyebrow. “Saké?”
Tatsumi nods. “Only the finest. Do you recall the story of the famous brewer whose devotion was so strong that his ghost is said to be still brewing saké? Well, he lives down the street from me, in Meifu.”
“Ah,” Oriya says, a sound of anticipation and pleasant surprise. “Your gift will be greatly appreciated. Would you care to join me then? Saké is best with company.”
“I would be honored,” Tatsumi says as Oriya finds the cups and begins preparing to serve.
“…and this, I tell you, is why I could not stand him at first.”
Tatsumi’s lips quirk in a little hint of a smile and he pours Oriya
another round. “Terrible! He was wearing the suit I had ordered for
myself. It was a custom job – specially ordered, and there he was, cool
as a cucumber, and I was short the cost of the fabric, which I had bought
for myself from a well-established fabric wholesaler - at discount, of course.”
“He has a bad habit of taking the best,” Oriya agrees, pouring for Tatsumi, who downs the saucer-like cup in one long gulp. “He was a terror when we were younger.”
“Speaking of terrors, have you met Terazuma-san? Muraki may not fear God or man, but amazingly, Terazuma makes him pause. I’ve heard that Terazuma may or may not have tried to eat him in Shikigami form.” Tatsumi leans back against the frame of the closed door. The jug’s nearly gone – it was very good saké.
“I’m sure Muraki would have given him something to chew on,” Oriya says with a wry smile. “At the very least, it would be indigestion.”
“Ha! I can imagine it,” Tatsumi says, flushed with drink as he stares at the floor, which seems a lot wobblier than it was before. “Oh, the saké is very good…I would have eaten something earlier if I had thought of it...”
Oriya moves to lie down on the tatami floor, reclining like an elegant panther as his silk sleeves spill around him. “That would have been far too sensible.”
“Yes, but it’s what I am. Sensible.” Tatsumi smiles, quite genuinely finding this very amusing right now.
“You shouldn’t be so sensible always. Be mad once in a while,” Oriya suggests.
It seems like such a wicked thing to consider, Tatsumi thinks, as he savors the aromatic flavor of the saké in his mouth. Alcohol fumes from heating the drink still linger in the air.
Instead, Tatsumi asks, “Is Kokakurou specially heated, or is it the wine? It seems rather hot in here, and it’s the middle of winter.”
“It’s heated,” Oriya replies. “The guests would be terribly cold in the winter if that wasn’t the case. The system’s based on an ancient Roman style of heating through the floors – less obtrusive than vents. If you like, you may open the door.”
Tatsumi pushes open the sliding paper door, and a sliver of cold air wafts its way into the room, deliciously icy with the breath of winter. Outside, snow veils the world from view, gracefully fat snowflakes flurrying down from the dark gray sky.
“Vents would definitely destroy the atmosphere,” Tatsumi replies as he works at worrying off his coat. He frowns minutely and tugs; mind seemingly fogged up with incomprehension at the simplicity of the cut of fabric wrapped around him.
“Yes. And vents wouldn’t allow you to do mad things such as open the door in the middle of winter just to watch the snow fall while staying warm. It would lose too much heat that way. Ah, here.” Oriya shifts to half-sit up.
Suddenly, and much to Tatsumi’s surprise, gentle but steady hands are helping him out of his coat, and, before long, he’s lying down, using his neatly folded coat beneath his head as a pillow.
“Thank you, Mibu-san,” Tatsumi says, feeling the floor pleasantly warm beneath him as the cold winter air sneaks into the room. It’s utterly decadent, letting the winter’s chill trickle in even as the heat is on. If it was Tatsumi’s own place, he wouldn’t allow such waste, but here he is, pleasantly drunk and enjoying it far too much for his own good. Be mad, a depraved little voice says inside of Tatsumi. You needn’t be the sensible one in a place like this.
“Not at all,” Oriya replies. “Mibu-san sounds far too like my father, Shinigami-san. Please call me Oriya.”
“Oriya.” Tatsumi tries the word out in his mouth. Surprisingly, it’s as lovely to say as its owner is to watch. “Then please, none of this ‘Shinigami-san.’ Call me Tatsumi. Or Seiichirou, if you prefer.” Tatsumi feels a little perverse thrill at the thought of being called by his given name by someone who is mostly a stranger still.
“Seiichirou?” Oriya says thoughtfully. “You know, his little secretary has the same name.”
“A coincidence,” Tatsumi replies. “I hadn’t thought of it before.”
“Tatsumi then?” Oriya says. “Two Seiichirous would be confusing.”
“Mmm, that’s fine.” Tatsumi closes his eyes, feeling too lazy to open them. “Everyone calls me Tatsumi.” Safe, once more, in routine. Tatsumi almost feels a little disappointed.
“Tatsumi.”
There’s a long pleasant stillness as the winter wind slips into the room with frozen fingers, playing along Tatsumi’s hair while the heat of the floor keeps him comfortable. Relaxed, Tatsumi can feel the threads of shadow all around him, the quiver of the papers on the desk as they rustle minutely in the draft, the sturdy lengths beneath the ceiling beams and the brittle black lines left in each pane of the paneled door.
And then, there’s Oriya, whose languid shadow slides almost sensuously along the floor as it draws…near?
Tatsumi nearly collides with Oriya as he moves to sit up, his eyes blinking open as a surprisingly soft pair of lips meets his in the beginnings of a chaste kiss. And like the swirl of drink in the tasting of wine (and with that flavor as well) Tatsumi’s mouth parts just a little and the sweetness goes a bit deeper, smoother than anything he’s had in a long time, and as intoxicating as all else.
And it’s over. Tatsumi draws back, a little surprised, as Oriya’s lips release him. All this time, he hadn’t noticed, but Oriya’s arm had been supporting him, a firm pressure against the back of his shoulders.
“Madness.” Tatsumi’s about to say more, but it’s a question that he’s already answered, the epiphany in his eyes giving them a particular unmatched hue of clarity.
Oriya smiles. “Now you understand.” Before Tatsumi can think, his lips have found Tatsumi’s again, and Tatsumi stiffens under the contact, aware now as to what’s going on.
“Wait.” Tatsumi pushes back and lifts a hand to his own lips, touching them as if burned. “What are you doing?”
“Think of it however you like.” Oriya looks at him, amused, but with a hint of hunger in his eyes. “The perverse predations of a yet another madman. A thanks for the present that you brought me. Or more simply, think of it as a moment of private madness on a solitary winter’s afternoon.” Oriya pauses, and his arm tightens around Tatsumi’s shoulder, pulling him closer. “You needn’t be sensible here. Not with me.”
Tatsumi blinks, astonished and overwhelmed at what he’s being offered. He begins to try to disengage himself from that contact, to move away, just as his sense of formality takes hold, and he’ll try to pretend that this isn’t what it obviously is…
“Excuse me. I’m afraid, Oriya-san, that I may have…”
And again, the lips press to his, slowly devouring him as if he’s being drawn into another person’s dream, another person’s private reality. Is it the madman’s insensibility infecting him? Tatsumi can feel his muscles tense unwittingly, but sometime, somewhere after that, it seems that between the drink and the kiss and the slip of silk against his fingers that are clutching Oriya, he’s relaxing into something strange and forbidden that he hadn’t thought possible before.
“But…what about…” Tatsumi tries to get his breath back, to put himself in order, his hand moving up to straighten his now slightly fogged spectacles.
“Don’t mind him. He’s not watching, nor would he care. He has other things to deal with besides us. You deserve a moment’s rest from that man,” Oriya whispers into Tatsumi’s ear, a tickling hot breath against his cool skin.
“A moment’s – rest…” In another context, that wouldn’t make so much sense, but right now, it seems the most reasonable thing to do. “What – do you want?”
“A few heated kisses in frost-bound winter twilight? I don’t know,” Oriya says with feigned ignorance, his voice sliding along Tatsumi’s throat as his tongue tastes at Tatsumi’s skin. “Perhaps I am waiting to hear your answer. What do you want, Seiichirou-san?”
“Me?” Tatsumi wonders when it was that he was last asked that question.
“Who else?” Oriya’s lips almost, almost tickle the sensitive skin of Tatsumi’s neck as he bears Tatsumi down to the hot floor, somehow feeling hotter for the slick chill of silk against his hands. A pair of hands (not his) worries at his tie, and a top button’s undone, toyed with as casually and carelessly as the unknotting of a string that’s tied for a promise around one’s little finger.
Dark, the lustrous shadows of Oriya work their way closer toward him, bringing Tatsumi against the edge of something dangerous, the press of a blade of desire rising somewhere deep inside, and he has a sudden shock of reality, of the world of reason and reliability, of sense and sanity. He gently, carefully withdraws himself from Oriya’s hands, in a conscientious manner that he hopes will not offend Oriya’s sensibilities.
Oriya then, noticing Tatsumi’s reluctance, draws back. The entire switch in tone has happened in a few seconds, the span between one breath and the other, and the situation is now firmly, Tatsumi feels, within control.
It’s as if it never happened.
“Perhaps another time then,” Oriya says softly, as he leans past Tatsumi to close the door, blocking the chill out.
“Thank you for your hospitality,” Tatsumi says coolly, with little indication as to his feelings on the matter, as he gathers up his coat and unfurls it to slide himself back into his protective shell.
“You’re quite welcome. Visit, if you like, in the future. ‘Winter’s long, and life’s fleeting,’” Oriya says, quoting a piece of poetry that they both recognize.
“’Yet still, the sakura blooms,’” Tatsumi responds, filling the last part of the lines.
Oriya says nothing, and his eyes slide to the figure that they’ve been ignoring for the last while.
Tatsumi nods his head again in thanks. “I will be going now. Thank you for handling my partner.”
“It’s my pleasure,” Oriya says, with a mischievous gleam in his eyes.
“I never knew you could subdue him so efficiently,” Tatsumi says, as he finally acknowledges Muraki’s presence. Muraki is almost unrecognizable, completely out of his usual context, half-dressed and trussed with white cords into a highly awkward position, unconscious with his cheek flat against the tatami floor in a way that’s bound to leave a mark later.
“It wouldn’t have worked as well if you hadn’t knocked him out with your shadows first. I don’t think he saw it coming.”
“Well, he has been very troublesome. How did Kurosaki-kun put it? ‘Get your freak partner’s hands off my partner before I call the Peace Division?’” Tatsumi quotes. “He asked for my assistance in setting up a situation in which he could peaceably teach Muraki a lesson in manners. It’s good to know that I can come here for your assistance in such business.”
“You realize he won’t be able to walk out by himself,” Oriya mentions. “Would you like help moving him?”
“No, I’ll be quite all right,” Tatsumi says. “But thank you for the offer.”
“There is one thing that I must ask before you leave,” Oriya says. “I’ve never seen rope this fine. What is it?”
“First grade silk rope corded through with women’s hair from Kobayashi’s Discount Kekkai Korner,” Tatsumi says, pleased to be asked. “Fifty percent off sale last season, and at already reduced prices, I bought it for a quarter of its original price. I was saving it for a rainy day. Or in this case…a snowy one.”
“Should I even ask what you require such ropes for? Smooth to the touch, strong enough to endure, but made especially to bind a Shinigami?” Oriya winks.
“I’m sure it’s purely for business purposes.” Tatsumi stands up and a shadow begins pooling underneath both himself and Muraki, verging on swallowing the two of them whole. “Thank you for your help. I’m sure Kurosaki-kun will appreciate that you wrapped the gift up for him.”
“Good bye, Tatsumi-san. Please, once he’s awake, ask Muraki if he remembers our college rope bondage club, and tell him to enjoy. And do let me know about this promised ‘asskicking.’ I’m curious to hear about the results.”
“Will do. Ja.”
And with that, they’re gone.
“Don’t think that I’ve forgiven you that easily, Muraki Kazutaka,” Oriya says to himself as he busies with filling his kiseru pipe. “Because I’m no longer nineteen, and able to forgive you without the slightest hesitation. Really, choosing your brother over me. What were you thinking?” Oriya shakes his head as he lights the tobacco and takes a puff, letting fragrant smoke fill the air. “Although, now that I think about it, he did have such lovely broad hands…And the two of you together…”
Oriya toes the door open with his foot, and the coiled curve of the white smoke is momentarily caught in the breeze, before being stolen by the winter wind.