"Numquam poetor nisi podager."

(I only spout poetry when my feet hurt.)

-Ennius, Saturae

Tsuzuki was awake and out of bed before dawn broke over the horizon. His eyes opened slowly and unsurely; he didn't have to wake up yet, he could go back to sleep if he really wanted to…

He turned a little, his head hurting. Tatsumi was still asleep, then, his own blue eyes closed peacefully. Tsuzuki felt the pit in his stomach, the awful churning sensation that came with watching his partner sleep. He swallowed hard around the sudden lump in his throat, around the tears that were threatening to well up in his eyes again.

He still had the bruise on his arm from where Tatsumi had gripped him with ice-cold fingers. He hadn't meant to clutch his forearm so tightly, Tsuzuki knew; half the things they did to each other weren't on purpose, but it hurt just the same. That was what the partnership was based on, after all: abuse. Tsuzuki sometimes wished that there was kindness buried there, sometimes saw kindness until Tatsumi grabbed him again, or pulled his hair, or hit him across the face.

Then again, Tsuzuki was only graceful when he was in pain.

He gave a small sigh that stirred the brown locks in front of his eyes. It was too late now; there was the pit, the knot, and he would have to wake up to take care of it. He pushed the blankets off of the hotel bed with chilled, shaking hands so that they fell to a pile on the carpet, and then he sat up. He swung his feet over the side of the bed and stood, limbs stiff from the cold and movements jerky.

The small room was too dark to see, and he had to feel his way to the refrigerator. The handle of it was cold and slippery from the sweat of his palm, and he opened it softly, light spilling over the carpet like liquid. There wasn't much to eat here – a few sandwiches that he'd packed himself – and the feeling in his stomach only became more clear. He held a hand to it, the skin prickling with gooseflesh.

Without an alternative, he reached for the sandwiches.

"Tsuzuki?"

He jumped slightly at the voice, and turned to face Tatsumi, who was sitting up in his corner in the room with his hair rumpled from sleep.

Tsuzuki's eyes hurt slightly as he tried to focus in the near-darkness. "What?" He wasn't mad about the bruise, not especially, but the sudden pulsating sensation on his forearm was rather uncomfortable.

Tatsumi blinked, a flash of blue in the gentle stream of moonlight that filtered through the brown curtains of the tiny hotel-room window. "What are you doing?"

"Getting something to eat." He'd thought that much should be obvious, with the tiny fridge open and—

And Tatsumi was looking at him funny again. Everybody looked at him funny at some point or another, as if they expected him to sprout horns at any moment. Tatsumi did it often, partially because he deserved it. He was so reckless, so careless and slightly suicidal. But he wasn't insane, no matter what people said. Only a sane person would love the pain as much as he did.

Masochism, Watari called it.

"It's three in the morning, Tsuzuki. You should get your sleep before we go back tomorrow."

Tsuzuki took a long look at his partner and then at the refrigerator. He needed the food. He needed the sleep.

"But I'm hungry…"

Tatsumi shook his head, as if he knew more about Tsuzuki than Tsuzuki himself. "No, you're not. You ate all that food back at the restaurant." He blinked again. He did that often, too. "What's wrong?"

Tsuzuki thought about it, mind whirring for an answer to the simple question.

When he was alive and in the care of the good doctor, he went for eight years without food or drink. His sister would try to make him consume something, anything, but he instantly rejected it. Starvation was the only way, he knew; and in those eight years, he had this same knot, this same pit in this stomach. Emptiness.

He discovered that these missions, this career of taking souls, gave him the exact same empty feeling, and he felt like he needed to eat.

"What's wrong, Tsuzuki?"

Tsuzuki's eyes were rounder than normal, he could feel it. Rounder and they focused harder, and he could feel the sting of tears at the back of them even though he would never show it.

"I'm hungry," was his only reply.

Tatsumi gave up and nodded slowly to show that he understood, even if he didn't, not really. Tsuzuki felt the knot tighten, and it was painful but in such a way that he liked it.

"You're a masochist," Tatsumi said as if reading his thoughts.

Tsuzuki merely shrugged at the truth that lay there.

"Maybe," he said, smiling.

But I work best in pain.