Work Text:
SNAPSHOT 554
"Shin, it's me. Let me in. I forgot to take the card key with me."
The voice at the door of the motel was jovial, earnest. It belonged to someone who might have a kind face, one where their eyes go soft and round whenever they see a video of an animal doing something most other humans would deem cute. It belonged to someone who might use a childish voice when speaking to younger children and pets. It belonged to someone who might help a stranger in need, someone who needs a little extra change to catch a bus ticket home. It could be anybody. Yet:
This is the enigma of a person to which this voice might belong to. An enigma because, remarkably, the voice in question belonged to someone who followed none of these habits, who cared not for appearing friendly, whose hands were so practiced at hurting others that washing them would be arbitrary.
Shin opened the door for this someone and their practiced hands. Shin had been waiting for their return.
"Thanks, puppy," said the voice. The voice in question belonged to someone who appeared much taller than he really was, with a head full of hair that swished about, a mathematical curvature of leaves. Hiyori was less of a person and more of a condition of nature, and as he passed Shin he ruffled his hair, sliding off his shoes with an easy hum. "Got what you asked for. They actually had two of them, so now you've got double!"
From the bag that Hiyori held came two bottles of protein drinks, both of which were vanilla flavor. In truth, Shin was hoping that they'd have access to a kitchen by now—he's getting desperate to have something savory, and although it doesn't always taste fantastic, Hiyori is familiar with the recipe to a soup he likes and can easily digest. It seems he'll have to keep waiting for that kitchen, though, as the motel that Hiyori settled on for tonight has little more than a slightly warm fridge.
In the back of Shin's mind came a mantra: This Will All Be Worth It One Day.
"Thanks," he said, clearing his throat once. "I can have both of these, yeah. Hopefully if I leave it in the fridge it'll keep overnight…"
"I can always get you something else to drink if not," said Hiyori, shrugging, as if Shin's limited diet hardly even mattered while they were permanently on the run.
It didn't matter, not really. Twenty days ago, Hiyori fed a nasogastric tube down Shin's nose and into his stomach for the third time in his life. It was uncomfortable, less so now. The tube was taped to his cheek using Hello Kitty tape, and every sixty or so days Hiyori makes good on his promise to change the tube.
"A nasogastric tube is a temporary solution to a nutritional problem. They aren't meant to be given long-term," Hiyori had said after the first insertion. "But it'll give you some relief while we're traveling, and that's where it'll be helpful!"
Looking back, Shin understood now that Hiyori had only ever starting putting the tube in to have something else he could control. It has worked to his advantage very well. He's created a system where Shin has become almost completely reliant on him for sustenance. God, how weak-willed he was to give up on eating. It was just too painful. Too many pitiful nights in bed, too many hours of listening to his body decompose from within itself. He'd lay there at night, writhing, certain he could hear his intestines creaking. It was impossible to find something he could eat that wouldn't have him seeing blood.
Hence: using the tube. Hiyori supplied supplement feed, attached it to the tube where it then swam, creamy off-white, through its pipeline, and Shin ate orally whenever his mouth started getting too dry in the meantime — or whenever he wanted to taste something again. Hiyori had explanations for these inclinations, too: non-oral feeding can cause a dry mouth, which is why it's extra important you brush your teeth lots and drink water when you can! and You're tasting for comfort. That's what they tend to call it in the medical world. Flavor as comfort.
It had been easier to let Hiyori handle it all. Easier but more dangerous. That tends to be how the gambles go with him. What's more is that Hiyori was absolutely obsessed with the tube itself, and would often stroke it with his fingers, would press his tongue against its smooth circumference, would take pictures of the inside of Shin's nostril. It seemed, inexplicably, to be some kind of sexual thing.
"I think it should be fine," said Shin, his voice quiet amidst his mental reflection. He set one of the protein drinks into the warm fridge and cracked the other one open, sat on the dirty little motel chair with his legs pulled up while he drank. The drink tasted like chalky shit, but it was better than the dry mouth that had been making him uncomfortable the last twenty-four hours.
Everything in Shin's life, for the most part, was controlled under the guide of Hiyori's own decisionmaking. It was easier to obey than to have to figure everything out, but there certainly must exist a version of himself out there free from Hiyori's control. How well that Shin got on his own remained a mystery.
From his chair he watched Hiyori undress. First the long black trousers are peeled off, folded, and set aside, then came the suit jacket and shirt underneath. Hiyori has an unusually hairless body, and Shin knew he was rather peculiar about waxing himself. He has the skin of a doll and the mannerisms to match. It was a well-established desire of Hiyori to turn himself into a lifesize doll, and from Shin's viewpoint, he may as well already be one.
Hiyori's briefs were green; they hold him well. Shin looked away when they came off, staring into the dark cave of his protein drink, imagining himself sinking into the wet, grainy depths and out of sight.
"We'll leave tomorrow at around nine in the morning," said Hiyori, his voice so projected that it violently launched Shin out of his thoughts. He twitched, trembled, looked up at his friend, now wearing a towel around himself. "I'll wake you up, but it'd be really great if you could be ready ahead of time."
"Right." Shin nodded. "I can get up."
"I have to do a job tomorrow, so I'll drop you off at the next place and then go out and get that done. If all goes well, I'll also be getting paid!" He beamed, clapping his hands together childishly in eerie contrast to the job Shin understood he would be doing. "I know it's been a little boring for you lately because everything has been so straightforward, but I'm hoping to get you involved in something fun soon."
Sometimes boring was better. "I don't mind not having to do things, but I wish I didn't have to be so reliant on you as a result. I'm… I mean—I mean, what I'm saying is that I'm happy to do whatever you need me to do."
Shin spoke quickly. He tended to feel like he was always saying the wrong thing, and that's a problem, because Hiyori relished in this discomfort. Already he had crossed the threshold of the motel room, had touched Shin's cold cheek, had slid his thumb affectionately from ear to chin. Once, months ago, he did this same thumb sliding and had said: I would love to make this incision.
"I know, Shin. I know you are," he whispered, secretive. He pat Shin's shoulder — it threatened to shatter under the touch — and promptly disappeared into the bathroom.
The sound of the water turning on could be heard, somehow, over the painfully loud beating of Shin's own heart as it threatened to pulverize the cartilage that cushioned the medial portion of his ribs. He sipped his drink and rubbed his sternum with his knuckles, uncomfortable as he tried to soothe the lingering presence of Hiyori stuck inside of his chest. He was always lingering in there. Unpleasant.
It took a moment to work himself up to it thanks to the grate of perpetual fear, but after a few more sips of the protein chalk Shin got up from his chair and transferred into the motel bed. It smelled of mildew and the pattern on the blankets was a plain brown with highly opaque swirls and dots. The smell did not bother him; Shin had long learned to not complain about accommodations ever since Hiyori had them stay in a love hotel with a medieval theme. Maces, iron maidens. The like.
He stuck his legs under the blankets. They were cold, ideal. It felt good on his skin. He pulled the smelly blanket up and finished his drink while listening to the sound of Hiyori humming in the shower. When he closed his eyes and listened, it gives a perfectly domestic illusion.
Shin liked Hiyori. It was not so simple as that, but if he had to give a reason as to why he was putting himself through all of this, it was because amidst all of the other, more complex feelings felt about Hiyori, he can also admit that he like plainly likes him. They have many years of memories together and that contributed greatly to the attachment. Hiyori, as scary as he was, had always gone to fascinatingly long and subtle lengths in his efforts to take care of Shin. These efforts were never missed, although Shin got the idea that Hiyori would rather they not be explicitly pointed out.
Maybe it made him a bad person to like him despite the scariness — despite what he does, despite the fact that Shin was complicit in what Hiyori does. Before Hiyori, Shin was a nothing and a nobody. Anxious, paper-thin skinned, controlled by the cycle of obsessive-compulsion to the point of losing sleep. Hiyori made him feel like a someone. Hiyori made him feel like there was someone there watching him. To be watched is to be protected. Hiyori became the cycle.
It was okay to be a bad person if it meant some relief was coming out of it. Every time Hiyori got paid, he shared a reasonable portion with Shin who then further shared most of that money with his younger sister. He sent it to her university education fund. That reward alone was enough to motivate Shin to continue enduring, and he used it to motivate himself out of bed each and every day.
He laid in the motel bed, thinking of her. He did not notice the sound of the water turning off, nor did he notice Hiyori's cessation of singing. It was only when Hiyori opened up the creaking bathroom door and appeared, damp and steamy and wrapped up in a towel, that Shin's awareness of his surroundings returned.
"Tired?" asked Hiyori, smelling of crisp apple. He circled the bed to collect some clothes from their shared suitcase. The rest of their belongings lived in the boot of the car parked outside.
Shin sank down onto the pillows a little. His voice came out smaller than it sounded in his head: "I guess. I always feel tired, though, it's nothing special."
Hiyori dropped his towel, giving Shin a good view of the massive scars hugging his back. Another mystery. "I wonder if I could supplement you with some more vitamins." He hummed, dressing in a pair of formal pajamas before towel drying his hair.
The scent of apple took over the entirety of the room. Shin was drowning in it. "Maybe. But it might not work, and that's fine."
"You're so passive," sighed Hiyori, climbing into bed with movements so mechanical they bordered on superhuman, on beautiful. The computations of a machine that did not know of its own self. He wrapped his arms around Shin and squeezed him rather tightly, to which Shin grunted. "I could crush your throat with my hands right this instant and you'd probably keep on laying there… ahaha. Your survival instincts are so lacking! It's a good thing you have me."
Shin swallowed. He wonders if his esophagus had already been crushed and time had simply not caught up with him yet.
Hiyori gently touched the nasogastric tube, his warm palm cradling the skin of Shin's cheek. "Say it, Shin. Say it's good you have me."
Automatic: "It's good I have you, Hiyori."
Hiyori smiled. "What a good boy." He kissed the corner of Shin's mouth. "Don't stay up too late. You know I don't like that."
"I know," said Shin, his voice soft and vacant, as if the force of that chaste kiss had knocked his soul around the inside of his body. He knew Hiyori disliked it when he stayed up late—he knew everything that Hiyori liked and disliked. He knew Hiyori.
From his scrunched position in bed, he could feel Hiyori turn and go still. Shin gifted himself the respite of staring at the nasty motel ceiling for the next two hours before drifting into a meaningless sleep.
SNAPSHOT 555: 10:44 A.M.
Shin was in the back of the car. Hiyori was nice and understanding enough to clear out some of his things and let Shin lay there for the drive because Hiyori was nice and understanding and so, so terrifying.
Usually Shin preferred to sit up front. He liked watching the scenery as the car moves, but he was just too tired this morning. Desperate to sleep a little more before they arrived at their next destination, desperate to show that he could be awake when Hiyori gets back for once. Desperate to show how good he is. Desperate to be alert.
This is the cycle that he was stuck in. Hiyori drove Shin to hotels and motels and sometimes rented homes if the stay was long enough, dropped him off, and then went to complete a job. Hiyori was paid for completing these jobs. Together they lived on the road, untethered to natural life. Sometimes Shin missed it. He missed the sanctity of it all — like this, he has nowhere to return to. If he were to have a falling out with Hiyori, that may as well be the end of his life.
Hiyori would kill him if they had a falling out. Shin's not stupid. He understood the work that Hiyori does. He knew what he does because he helped him, sometimes, sat at his little laptop in hotel rooms as he researched security and weaponry and ordered large bags whenever they were needed.
That's right. Hiyori was scary for a reason. Even as he sang along to the radio whilst driving, Shin understood why he was scary. He embarked on this journey knowing. He was just as despicable.
There was no baptism from this.
The fabric of the car seat created friction against the nasogastric tube every time Shin shifted his head slightly. He decided, without hesitation, that the continuous, sore rubbing of the tube against his cheek was divine punishment for what he had gotten himself involved in.
SNAPSHOT 556
The hotel — it was a hotel this time, not a motel — that Hiyori had reserved was a decidedly nice one. There was one large bed with plush white sheets, an air conditioning unit, a table and a chair and a small kitchenette equipped with a hot plate, which was something of a luxury. The floors looked like they should belong in a bowling alley and the white walls did little to pull the place together. Still, though: a kitchenette! A hot plate! Lap of luxury.
"Surprise!" said Hiyori, throwing up some jazz hands. "I can make you something to eat in here."
Shin smiled despite himself, standing in the kitchenette and observing the provided hot plate. It did not have the feeling of a kitchen; the walls were empty and the countertop was a boring, corporate color. But it didn't need to feel like a kitchen and it did not need to inspire comfort. All it needed to do was function.
He clicked his finger against the ON button and a red light switched on to warn the user it was heating up. That's right; all it needed to do was function.
"While I'm out, can you buy some ingredients for me? The usual ones." Hiyori set their shared suitcase down and popped it open, kneeling as he rummaged about for the necessary sack full of money. He removed a clump of paper bills, the color staining each note brighter than the decorations in the hotel room. "You saw the convenience store when I pulled in, right?"
"Yeah," said Shin, accepting the blood money.
"I thought you would. If you still feel up to doing tasks, I left some names in the journal you can investigate." Hiyori jerked a finger at the suitcase and then bowed. "I'm going hunting now, my obedient doggy. See you in ten hours!"
"Um," said Shin. He was interrupted as the door shut in front of his face.
The silence of the hotel room met him like a friend.
Get ingredients and check the journal. He could get that done quickly. Before leaving for the convenience store he took a cursory look around the hotel room, felt overwhelmed by its great big emptiness, and then promptly left with a key card and bag in hand.
Shin took the elevator down to the ground floor of the hotel and then exited out the front doors. The front doors opened wide like the mouth of a whale. The sky was sad and bright grey, albeit absent from any rainclouds. It looked like a great big maw to heaven.
The trip to the convenience store did not take long. The moment that Shin stepped foot inside of that little store it was as if every security camera in the entire building swiveled to focus in on him. He never looked at them, because looking at them would give away his guilt instantaneously, but he could feel the heavy photic pressure imprinted on him as he journeyed down the aisles.
Bouillon cube. Thin rice noodles. Shin chucked a package of tofu into his handheld shopping tray and picked up a snack-sized portion of celery, which had been agreeing with his stomach as of late. He knew exactly what to get even under the pressures of being watched. That was a sign of competence. A sign of being taught and learning well from the imposed lessons.
Shin paid using the cash, collected the change and tossed it into the bag of ingredients instead of placing it all back into his pocket. This next part was the most fun part — he stepped foot outside of the shop, blinked, and—
—suddenly found himself riding up the elevator again, heart beating, and a blink—
—and then he was back in the hotel room, shutting the door behind himself as he submerged himself in the careless silence again.
Into the shitty fridge went most of the ingredients and inside of the shower went Shin's body in an attempt to regulate his frantic heartbeat. He could go places without Hiyori — in fact, most of the time he preferred to, because Hiyori's doll-like body carried with it a magnetic echo that set off security cameras and alarms — but it was never pleasant. Alone or accompanied Shin carried this important sense of paranoia with him, something so obtrusive that it may as well be a pet leech living on top of his head.
Best to wash that all away. The shower temperature was set to high because a high enough shower temperature rinsed off one's inner monologue, leaving the sore heat on skin instead. He remembered to cover the end of his nasogastric tube with a fitted piece Hiyori had bought and then stepped into the warmth.
It felt so, so good. This baptism by hot gasoline. Shin sighed, leaning his head against the unfamiliar wall, enjoying the comfort of being within a self-enclosed space. He shampooed his hair, ran conditioner through the ends. He washed his body, cleansed his limbs and torso and insides. Just like that he became clean.
When the steam rose heavily into his nostrils Shin understood he had spent enough time showering. He could stay in here longer — wanted to, even, but once he stood in the shower for too long and ended up fainting, the combination of heat and pressure too much for his tired, sickly body. When he had come to Shin had found he'd hit the side of his head. Hiyori was not happy to find a red welt left behind as evidence.
"You aren't being careful enough," Hiyori had said, and at the time Shin could only wonder why someone as prolifically cruel as he was always so fixed on the state of Shin's own health.
He shut the water off, toweled himself dry, then laid down naked on the bed to savor the feeling of cold, laundered bedsheets against his warm and sore and blistering skin. A full-body salve. First Shin laid on his back and then he flipped over and laid on his belly. He pressed his cheek into the soft sheets, inhaled, and when the moment passed, stood and dressed in sweatpants and a t-shirt.
For Shin, every moment existed as a ledge to lift him to the next. To stay in one moment for too long was to consider the state of his whole life was to consider this on-the-run, aimless reality he'd sunken himself into where he slept next to someone who is terrifying, exciting, otherworldly and accepted his subordination in relation to him. Not everyone gets to life a life that is well executed. Not everyone gets what they want.
Shin retrieved Hiyori's journal, glazed over the list of names he was meant to investigate, and pulled out his laptop to get to work.
First he sat at the desk. Then he sat on the bed. Then he connected his nasogastric tube to some enteral supplement and squeezed the bag every now and again as he worked. He flushed out the tube when it was all done.
"You can have a very special job, Shin," Hiyori had cooed. "You can be in charge of researching the targets. What lives do they live? What medical procedures have they had done? Will many people miss them when they die?"
Will many people miss Shin Tsukimi when he dies?
No. There were barely any people alive right now who knew who Shin was, let alone where he currently lived and what he did as a 'job.' Anyone who remembered him now only remembered the version of him that existed as a child or a very, very young adult, one with a smiling face and an uncertain heart. Perhaps it is better this way. Perhaps it is better for that Thing to be left behind for good.
He worked and worked and worked on the laptop, researching names, noting down histories about these strangers. Seeing them against the wall of a screen made it all seem so impersonal even if what he wrote was exceptionally personal.
Soon enough Shin had done everything he has been asked. This next part was like clockwork too: he put the laptop away, curled up on the bed, and fell asleep near-instantly, as if his body had been waiting for this moment all day.
SNAPSHOT 557
Shin awakened. He may as well never have fallen asleep in the first place, or so it felt. He could hear a door opening. In anticipation, he sat upright.
Hiyori was here, Hiyori was home. Hiyori had arrived. There was a spatter of blood on the end of his suit tie as he untucked it from within his jacket but there remained no other proof of his deed from the last eleven or so hours. His voice came like a pleasant siren: "Hi, Shin!" as he padded over to the bed and leaned forward, forcing himself into Shin's space like a parasite. "Did you miss me?"
"Yes," said Shin, because he did and because he knows what he's meant to say.
"I thought you might," Hiyori mumbled, stroking Shin's cheek with a cold hand, this same hand that had so recently killed another human and carefully sliced and quartered their organs for profit.
Shin noticed it the very first time Hiyori had taken him apart: how steady his touch was, how certain he was of each step to the procedure. So practiced. He shivered under the palm of death's gentle pressure, leaning his cheek into the touch because he knows it would be pointless to act like he doesn't want to. "I did all of the things you asked me to, by the way."
"Did you? And you had time to spare, clearly." Hiyori pat the bed, climbing onto the mattress on both knees. "But you know I don't like when you take naps once the sun goes down…"
Shin swallowed. "Sorry." The touch of death localized itself to Hiyori's thumb. That thumb rubbed Shin's jaw. Incision line.
"If you were really sorry, you'd stop doing it, Shin."
He was right.
Hiyori flicked his tongue out, darting to wet over Shin's lips, and when the contact was made Shin knew to be a good boy and open his mouth some. Hiyori was pleased and hummed to show it, and this is the language between them both — their mouths pressed together as Hiyori lapped over the muscle of Shin's tongue, the massage so slow and coaxing that it may as well be another form of torture. It was always torture. Everything about this entire setup was torture, every time.
Every time Hiyori always wanted something different, too. It would be helpful to know what to anticipate.
Shin grabbed the bloodied tie, tightening his hand around the fabric, twisting it to draw Hiyori a little bit closer. Their kiss was hideous, wanting. This was all Shin had — all he got, really, by way of satiation and social experience — and so he always wanted more. Wanted whatever could possibly be offered to him.
Being passive was hardly choice of Shin's because Hiyori had instilled this sort of behavior into him through fear and coercion and unending affection. The tie that Hiyori wore — the bloodied red one — disappeared into obscurity into the void of Shin's closed eyelids. Its wet and cold texture and its soft satin fabric became nothing against the hot press of one mouth unto another.
"Can we play?" asked Hiyori, linking his fingers into Shin's and pressing them into the cushion of the mattress. He nosed the tube. "Can we play? Please? I thought about you today when I was working. I want to see your insides so badly." His second hand lifted Shin's shirt up and rubbed a palm over his belly, thumb grazing the bellybutton, pushing down sensitively. "I really want to see them."
They could be seen with ease. Hiyori was a man who extricated viscera for a living. Put a scalpel in his hand and he'd be able to grant his own wish with delight. Shin knew that's why he never opened up his box of instruments whilst they were in the same room; he wouldn't be able to help himself. His life existed against the contingency of an unopened box.
"I know," said Shin, meeting Hiyori's exploring hand with his own to deflect him away. Human meat flesh against proverbial doll plastic. "Not today, Hiyori… maybe another time."
Hiyori sighed, but he was regulated enough to instead dip his head to cool torso where, almost with a sense of immaturity, he lathed his tongue over the spot where Shin's aorta lived and breathed. He kissed the spot, then, and looked from underneath flickering eyelashes: "Are you in pain today?"
The question took Shin off guard, though not because Hiyori had never asked before. It was more the lack of unipolarity in mood that often permeated their conversations. One moment Hiyori was happy, was adoring, and then he was frustrated, and then his hand would be on Shin's throat, and then it would be by his side again. "Yes," he said truthfully, as he usually did. "It's not that bad."
Hiyori seemed to think about this. He traversed along a track, moving from stomach to neck. "I'll be gentle."
He meant what he said.
Shin was skittish, too willing. Whatever happened was what he would take, and that was not because he had resigned himself to play corpse but because the novelty of Hiyori's touch was remarkable enough to have Shin bend towards it regardless of intent.
Here was how Hiyori showed gentleness:
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When he undressed Shin, he did not rush, and
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as he touched his body, he did not dig his nails in, and
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when Shin arced his hips skyward for more, more Hiyori gave him exactly what he wanted, palm curved around him, spreading wetness beneath his fingers, and
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he did not require using Shin intrusively, only—
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externally, as he fit himself between Shin's two slick thighs and helped himself to the trembling humanity in his arms.
And when Shin and his Hiyori had each had what they needed, Hiyori kissed Shin in a way that masqueraded as indulgent but was really thankful. This was a quiet truth known to Shin. Something for him to understand and never, ever share. He would die knowing this. Who would he share it with, anyway?
SNAPSHOT 558
Soup was made for dinner. Shin ate all of it without complaint. Hiyori took a picture of him bare on the bed, aired out the photo, and added it to his scrapbook. He laid in bed with him, stroked the tube with his fingers breathily, then put a gameshow on the television.
There was a time where Shin hated that scrapbook full of photos, hated the phototaking. He still hated it now, in some other way, something more complicated than what he would like to admit. Painfully, miserably, though, that scrapbook was the only proof of Shin's existence. He felt that if photos stopped being added it would be a sign of his own decline. And because Hiyori refused to be in any of the photos, it acted as proof of his life, too, by proxy.
If only he could get one photo of Hiyori.
.
.
.
.
.
SNAPSHOT 591
Mattered progressed. Once more Shin found himself living the same day as always. He did his tasks, mourned his life, mourned his behavior. He sent his sister money, he waited for Hiyori, he was afraid of Hiyori, he couldn't bare to be away from him for long. He laid in bed with Hiyori. He stared, for hours, at a hotel ceiling in the dead of night.
The same day was the same day was the same day was the same day was the same day again and again and again and again and again. The same pain. The same guilt. The same regret. The same fear. The same blood money. The same Hiyori. Unchanged. Shin, unchanged. The same scrapbook. The same soup recipe. The tube to be changed once again. The same skin. The same dreamless nights. The landscapes outside changed from one location to another. The hotels changed in decoration, in corporation. The ceilings changed. But the same day happened continuously nonetheless.
They lived at the edge of a crumbling cliff. The view of the ocean was extraordinary. Shin could never look away.