アイスクリーム

Since we were kids, Hanzo always knew how to push something to the edge of getting caught. Strictness made him rigid, but it also implanted within him a bitter rebellious streak. This, in hindsight, is unsurprising. Youth was never meant to grow up in a cage and Hanzo was no exception; he resented being stifled as I did. Our father and the elders never saw this side of him, of course. He learned from a young age to keep such things hidden from the outside world, but I was entangled with his secrets as he was with mine and we were intimately close.

He still acted proper. Haughtiness was in his nature and he had an impressively sized ego. I poked fun at him for being so boring. He got more serious as he aged whereas I never stopped trying to fly for freedom.

It was in the throes of our shared adolescence that he took my hand and led me to a place brand new. I mean that both metaphorically and literally. Far from the city one day on vacation from the confines of Hanamura, a rare treat. We were away from the hot springs, our father had already gone to sleep early, and Hanzo brought me to a copse of trees. Already I missed the warmth of the water and the steam from it was a tantalising sight. We slipped away into the forest.

We were foolish then, stupid and young. But we had each other and that was all that mattered. I was greedy about much in my life, a problem exacerbated by my father spoiling me rotten. Hanzo was different though, because I always had him. It never occurred to me that we could be greedy with each other because we already had each other.

He kissed me that day, in the winter cold. He kissed me with my back against a tree, pressing his lips to mine with an insistence that matched his forceful words. It was an action that was instantly seared into my memories. I pulled him closer, desperate and hungry. I did not think this was odd, I only felt that what we were doing was right because it felt right. It felt good. I was delirious with power, giddy from the physical contact.

Hanzo indulged me, sliding his hand under my robes and making me realise we could have each other in more ways than I thought. He’d stoked in me a blazing fire of curiosity and it was fueled by my daring. This was no joke. It was one thing to be wrestling or sparring, another thing to hug in precious moments, and yet another to tease each other the way we always did. I think Hanzo was possessed by a simple and complete assurance about what he wanted and how he was going to get it.

“Genji,” he murmured into my ear, tickling me and making me shiver.

I didn’t speak. I had nothing to say. I think I must’ve been nervous and excited all at once, and a little scared that if I spoke, I would shatter this reality into the splintered fragments of a dream. I wanted to hold onto it and preserve every single bit of it. I wanted to remember the look in Hanzo’s eyes, his familiar eyes with an expression I had never seen before on his face. The strands of his hair that had separated from the rest. The touch of his fingers on my skin, calloused but gentle.

I would have been content to live there forever, within that bubble of time that one winter far away from Hanamura. Hanzo’s hand on my thigh, on my back, his lips and tongue on my neck and collarbone. We were feverish, not doing anything horribly sexual and yet so incredibly needy for each other as we chased some kind of satisfaction.

I felt a powerful stirring in my chest. Something more than the racing of my heart or the beating of his. We touched and touched and maybe he reached between my legs, that I can’t remember because I remember unleashing energy. Every synapse of my surged with strength, pure power. And I could feel the same energy from Hanzo, I could smell ozone in the air. We were bathed in green and blue light but it was not the dragons that we were concerned with. It was each other’s lips, it was the raw exposure of love and desire being laid bare under a light snowfall.

I don’t remember how it ended. I remember we slept together, closer than usual and tangled in a blanket or two. I remember waking up, light on my eyelids. Hanzo sitting and looking more relaxed than ever. Looking at something thoughtfully before noticing me, giving me a tender gaze and brushing my hair back.

He wrote me a letter and I wondered how it sounded in his head. Hanzo, who’d never stop thinking for even a moment. In this single letter, Hanzo showed me more genuine emotion than he showed anyone else. Of course, to be outwardly affectionate or loving at this stage in life he would be seen as weak. And I cannot deny there was something exciting about our illicit relationship, the thrill of keeping secrets at that age, having Hanzo all to myself. I cherish his words and have committed them to memory:

You are beautiful, face flushed from both cold and heat. Your eyes are familiar and had I eternity I would gaze into them now until ever. I think about the warmth of your skin, your delicious scent so evocative and sweet. Let me touch you, my sparrow, and I will show you how I love you.

The years were not kind to either one of us. I do not believe Hanzo has learned yet how to love himself or forgive himself the way I forgive him. To be hurt by him was the ultimate betrayal, but I don’t dwell on it now. What I want to dwell on now is what we have now, today and tomorrow and onward. It took us so long to get back to speaking terms, though less time to return to sleeping terms.

He looks so peaceful. It is a gorgeous sunrise, streaks of gold painting the sky, shafts of light illuminating the clouds. I can feel Hanzo stirring. He looks up at me, half-asleep and barely awake. I cannot help the gesture; I reach for his face and tuck his stray hair behind his ear. He takes my hand and wordlessly presses it to his cheek. It is the type of self-indulgence he almost never allows himself.

“Good morning, anija,” I whisper, my voice soft with the tenderness I feel in my heart.

Hanzo fixes me with a stare that makes my skin - synthetic and natural - prickle. His familiar brown eyes are filled with an expression I recognise, an expression of love. This is not the rigid and serious man he was raised to become, nor the ruthless assassin, nor the bitter and angry exile. I suppose all of those are facets of him, but this is the Hanzo I know, the Hanzo only I get to see.