"I want…" Uta gazes at me, relaxed and open. We're sitting in his apartment, a small utilitarian room above the shop with an open floor plan. He sits next to me, his legs crossed under him, on a curved bamboo recliner that matches the one I'm perched on. There's a small table between us, and we sit before the large sliding glass door which is open and letting in the late March breeze.
He's patient, placid, and encouraging. If there was anyone else in my tiny world who could help me, I'd be there right now. It's not that I don't trust him, I do, without hesitation, but I fear my request might insult him. "Touka's invited me to her graduation ceremony, and the party afterward. I want to try and look… as normal as possible."
He nods, leaning forward to rest his chin on the back of his hand. "She didn't ask this of you, right? This is something you want to do on your own?"
"No," I drag my hands through my hair, "she's fond of my unruly mop, now." I duck my head, knowing my cheeks are flame red.
"So, what exactly do you want help with? Do you want me to dye your hair?"
"No, that's not a problem, but," I put my hands on the top of my knees, "I don't know what to do about my fingernails."
"You do need a good manicure." He laughs. His nails are as black as mine, but they shine with bits of sparkly glitter. The look is a perfect compliment for him, and normally for me it is a good statement, but not when I want to pass as a normal human.
"Can you, I don't know, cover them up temporarily? I don't want to wear gloves, or keep my hands in my pockets all night."
"Of course I can. What color do you want them?"
"Just normal fingernail color."
He closes his eyes, for a second, deep in thought. He picks up his cell phone and sends off a quick text message. It dings in reply almost immediately. He turns to a small rolling cart beside his chair and drags his fingers through the first drawer. He pulls bottles of nail polish out and holds them up to the sun.
Clive comes through the front door of the apartment and walks around me so he can sit on the end of Uta's chair. "What do you need to see my hands for?" He presents them, even as he asks, but palms up. Uta leans forward and lightly nibbles the heel of Clive's hand. The chemistry between the two of them is intense, and I have no doubt they'd be having sex any moment if I wasn't sitting there, coughing politely beside them. Uta turns Clives hands over and pouts, seeing his bright fuschia nails.
"What? You don't like the color?" Clive is tentative "I've had it on for a week now, you should have said something." His chin quivers a little.
"They are beautiful, just like you," Uta says, drawing the nails of his free hand down Clive's scarred cheek. "But I need to see what normal human nails look like. I've got a commission from Kaneki-kun.
"Oh, well, where's the nail polish remover?" Clive asks, brightening. Uta takes round pads to each of Clive's fingers, tenderly removing the polish. He drops the purple-tinged pads on the ground, while Clive rolls his eyes. His nails are a healthy pink with little moons at both the top and bottom. Uta picks from among the nail polishes and finds one that almost matches.
"Thank you, darling."
"Is that all you need?" Clive asks, picking up the trash.
"For now…," he says, leering. Clive leaves us to our work and heads into the apartment. "Turn toward me and we'll get this done. We don't want to be late for graduation."
"You're going, too?" I ask. Uta begins wiping the polish off his own hands, but instead of black tinged pads, they come away with only glitter.
"Yes, Clive and I, both. We can all go over together, unless you've made plans with Touka. We've made arrangements for a taxi to pick us up."
"No, we're not supposed to meet until after she graduates. I'd like to go over with the two of you." He reaches out and takes my right hand and his nails are still as black as mine. "Is that super-strength paint, or are you the same as me?"
"Same as you, sort of," he says, as he spreads white school glue on the flesh outside of my nails. He blows on it, encouraging it to dry faster and then does the left hand.
"I didn't know; who tortured you?"
"No one," he says, and begins the careful process of laying the first coat of paint on my thumb.
"Then how…?"
His face loses some of its expression and he looks like the first time we met. "Would it surprise you to find out that pain is one of my kinks?"
"No!" I mock gasp, but I can't maintain the fake indignation, and begin to chuckle. "I'm shocked," I stutter through the laugher and his smile grows even wider. Then the whole connotation dawns on me again. "Wait, you don't…" I gesture toward Clive with my chin.
Uta follows my gaze and, after a second, his mind catches up to mine. "NO!" he shouts, almost leaving his seat. There is real anger in his eyes, but then he calms, and settles back in. "Never," he says quieter. "I would never do that to him."
"I didn't think so, but if you did, you'd only do what he enjoyed." A moment of understanding passes between us; I feel like our relationship has matured as we acknowledge that there are somethings that must be sacrificed for the people we love.
"But I like it when he hurts me." He smirks and that brief connection pops like a soap bubble. "You remember that I am a member of the Clowns, correct?"
"Yes."
"Do you know our purpose?"
"I didn't think there was one."
"Unofficially, we say 'There's no point in living if things aren't interesting. The ones who gets the last laugh are us, the Clowns.' Now, as an outsider, you can take that many ways, but as someone who's been on the inside, let me tell you what it means to me: Try new things and be the last one standing."
He finishes the first coat of paint, and instead of switching to the other hand, he does a second coat. The black is almost completely hidden behind the flesh-colored paint. It looks too brown for me, but I trust his artistic eye.
"Ok, I guess I can see that."
"I've seen, and participated in, a lot of things: cannibalism, Sadism, necrophilia… so it was many years ago when I first saw nails come in black after an amputated finger regenerated. I'd been painting my nails for years, as a statement, but I was curious."
"Curious?" I'm terrified to ask what that means, but that sick feeling in my stomach is nothing in comparison to my own curiosity. He finishes that hand and leans over to the cart. He pulls out a spray can and lightly mists over the paint. "Hold your hand away from your body; don't be tempted to use it." He takes up my other hand, applying two coats of paint in the same way.
"Ok, sure." I put my hand on the back of the chair, palm flat, so I won't rub my nose or scratch an itch.
"I tried an experiment," he says, going back to our previous topic. "One night, this was years ago, when I was still a teenager, I cut my left pinky off, below the first knuckle.
"You what?" I ask, startled as bile rises in my throat; I choke on the vomit that suddenly appears in my mouth.
He puts an empty cup under my chin, "Spit." I gag, but keep my hands, both wet with polish, up and away from my mouth as a slurry of gunk spills out of my mouth. He uses a tissue to clean my lips. "Clive? Can you bring out a bottle of water?'
"Sure," his voice replies. "Still or sparkling?"
Uta cocks his head at me, waiting for my answer. "We can have sparkling?"
"Bring two sparkling, please."
"On it," I hear the fridge open and close and he pours the water into glasses over ice.
"You have to be careful that it is only sparkling water and not club soda, or something with other ingredients. I've tried the flavored kind, that was a disaster."
Clive holds the cup to my lips; I gargle the first swallow and spit it into the cup that Uta is still holding for me. Then I take a big gulp, before nodding to Clive. He puts the cup down and wanders off.
"Let me know when your stomach is settled, and I'll continue the story, or if you prefer, we can skip it."
"I think I'll be ok."
"I started with the pinky because I hardly use that in my art." He holds the nail polish brush between his thumb and forefinger and mines a sewing motion. "You know I heal quickly, just like you, so I did that one finger and then waited to see the results. I had full range of motion in mere minutes, and a lovely black matte nail. It was exactly what I wanted, so each night for the next nineteen days, I cut another one off."
For a moment I think I'm going to be sick again, but I swallow hard and chase the bile back down my throat. He waits patiently with the cup, and when he's sure I'm not going to lose it, he puts it down and sprays the second hand. He touches the fingers of the first, and is satisfied because he pulls out another bottle of paint that is a soft pink color. All the black is hidden, but my nails look so artificial, until he adds a single coat of pink, then they look amazing. He does all ten nails, then turns back to the cart and finds a bottle of off-white paint and freehands the tiny moons at the base and tips.
He takes a tissue and dabs at the corners of my eyes.
"Thank you, I didn't even realize I was crying."
"You have a beautiful soul, Kaneki-kun," he says, touching my knee. "As both a Ghoul and a human."
I sniff back the tears as he applies a last layer of clear paint, and as it dries, it turns matte.
"That's awesome. How did you do that?"
"It's just that kind of paint," he laughs. He carefully peels the school glue from around my nails and discards it, and I'm done. "Try not to touch anything until we leave, ok?"
"Ok."
Uta motions for me to follow him back into the apartment, and I manage to pick up my water with only my palms. Clive smiles at me from the couch, where he sits reading a tattoo magazine, already dressed in khaki skinny jeans with a brown cardigan over a bright purple shirt and a brown tie. The scars on his face are deep and old, but his hair flops over most of them.
Uta starts disrobing, despite the fact that I'm there. He kicks off his shoes and pants, throwing everything into a heap on the floor, until he stands naked before the closet. I'm hypnotised by the sheer number of tattoos he sports from his neck to his heels, and I can only see him from the back.
"Wow," I say turning to look at Clive, whose eyes are busy appreciating a different aspect of Uta's anatomy. "You do really nice work."
"You ready for your first yet?"
"I'm still trying to decide what I want to live with for the rest of my life."
"Understandable," he says. In the meantime, Uta has pulled on a pair of gray leggings and over them, a pair of short black pants that end above the knee. He gathers the leggings right below the knee, and on him, it looks perfect. He throws on a tank top that barely covers his midriff, and a loose black sweater goes over that, and he looks his usual blend of crazy and perfect. He grabs a bottle of chunky holographic nail polish, and we all rush out the door as a taxi waits for us at the curb.
I shouldn't have worried, next to Uta, I look as plain as white rice.