Chapter Four: Shivers
"Here, bon." Watari offers me a new towel. He doesn't look weary from the long journey or from working around the clock. As a matter of fact, he looks almost excited. He leans his hands on his knees and looks at Tsuzuki. "Still no change in his condition, I take it."
I shake my head and place the towel on Tsuzuki's brow. He's been like this, *melting*, ever since I woke up. I would say he's burning with fever, but he still feels cold.
Watari walks over to the desk and opens his laptop. "Actually I kind of suspected it."
I get up and walk over to peek at the screen. "Did you find out something about that ghost?"
Watari's glasses are reflecting the screen as he clicks open a file. "The Western Department is still struggling with the case, but so far, no process. The police are at Harvey's house, which hampers our investigation." He gives me a quick look and one lock of blond hair falls over his eyes. "Bon, you have to understand that though the Western Department is pretty powerful, and they probably could end this matter with a mere snap of a finger, they can't risk bringing the soul back to where it belongs, because as far as we know right now, it could take Tsuzuki with it."
"But how can a Western ghost capture a shinigami's soul?" I demand. I'm being unfair, I know, because Watari doesn't know it any better than I do. But he always has theories.
This time is no exception. He starts frantically typing something. "Well, there is the possibility that it was a new type of yuurei, a Westernized yuurei, if you catch my meaning. Its deep love and hatred for a gaijin altered its shape and powers. Now, what might result from that kind of union ---" An old picture of a pale nun fills the screen. Watari taps the side of the keyboard. "Maybe it gave the ghost the ability to affect Japanese immortals."
"I know that picture," I tonelessly tell him and turn my back, "it's the ghost of the Borley Mansion."
"Borley Oratory," Watari corrects me. "It haunted the place for decades before its bones were found and finally put to rest. I wish we were facing something as simple as that here. Harvey's wife doesn't seek salvation or rest. It seeks revenge."
"I don't think so," I say, thinking aloud, the thought just popping into my head. "I think it's gone mad from its hatred. It doesn't know what it is doing."
"Like a yuurei, right? But something holds it." I feel Watari's eyes on me as he speaks. "The letters."
I spin around. "So what are we doing here? Shouldn't we be searching for them? What the hell did Tatsumi-san mean by 'staying put and waiting for more orders'?!" I fling my fist to the wall and grit my teeth. "No one knows what that thing is, how could they give us any further instructions?" I growl, my both hands clenched into shaking fists.
"Bon!" Watari gets up and hurries to me. I shake off his hands when he attempts to take a hold of my shoulders. "Bon, calm down. We will find a way, but we have to investigate these things carefully before acting. You wouldn't risk Tsuzuki's soul, would you?"
I sniffle and hastily wipe my nose to my sleeve, then realise that my cheeks are wet. I'm crying, and I hate it. Watari puts his hand over my head and gives my hair a gentle tussle.
"Tatsumi knows what he's doing. He called for the needed reinforcements and is currently investigating the meaning and placement of the letters. Our job right now is to guard Tsuzuki and take care of him."
"Yes, I *know*!" My voice sounds irritated and childish to my own ears. I hiccup and continue, hoping I won't sound as teary. "But there is no point in just watching and... not being able to do anything."
I'm of no use to Tsuzuki this way.
Watari just sighs and runs a hand through his hair. We stand there in silence, Watari trying to find something to say and me roughly wiping the tears from my eyes and cheeks, trying to get a hold of myself. I don't usually lose my patience like this.
I sit down on the floor next to Tsuzuki's futon and, almost against my will, look at him. His eyes have opened again, the warm purple colour paled into a dull shade of navy blue. I thought he was getting better. I thought he would wake up, but no, it's worse now than before. He no longer fights. He just lies there. I don't feel anything but cold and sadness radiating from him when I reach out my hand to close those unseeing eyes that I don't know. They will open again, I know, but then I'll just close the lids again. Tsuzuki's moving slightly, which is a surprise, even though he's just shivering a little.
"Do shinigami suffer from hypothermia?" I wonder aloud, because he looks so cold right now, the shivering somehow making it even more poignant. It's a sharp reminder that he's still alive, still in a mortal body, and the danger he's in seems all the more severe.
"It is not common," Watari replies, and I hear him typing something on his laptop. "But we must be ready to expect anything right now."
That does it then. I can't bear to see Tsuzuki like this, even his eye colour turning icy. I tuck the covers under his chin and then fetch mine, too, and throw them over my shivering partner.
"I'm going to get some tea," I mutter as I open the door. "We have to get him to drink something."
Watari murmurs something back, I bet he didn't even hear me. When he's investigating something, it's no hope trying to talk to him. He'll return back to us once he's found something, which in this case might not be much. Why do I get the feeling that we're all just sitting around, pondering endlessly over things while nothing really gets done? I rub my eyes and bite my lip, hard. Watari makes me so mad right now. When he heard that Tsuzuki is down and in need of help, he came over and started working, like this is a normal case, and what's worse, he seems *happy* to do it. Sure Tsuzuki is turning a new shade of blue each minute and he's got his soul taken by a ghost of some kind which no one seems to know nothing about, but hey, it's something new. Something *fucking* interesting to poke at and ponder over while the last signs of any kind of life flee him.
That's not what I'm going to do. I'm going to bring my partner back, and I can't do that by standing around.
I fill the cup with steaming tea and return to the room, my pace faster and my back straightened. I will do something, I have to. Watari is still working on his computer when I close the door behind me. I kneel down at Tsuzuki's side and put the cup on the floor for a while. I have to raise him up some, so I snake my arms around his chest and pull him up, then settle a few pillows behind his back to support him. His eyes have closed, but I know it won't last. He feels so cold I swear I can see frost in his hair when I tilt his head up slightly to make him swallow the tea. I've never done this before, and feel kind of awkward when I bring the cup to his lips, but I seem to do something right because I manage to get him to swallow the liquid. My hands are shaking, tired for having to reach so far and I scoot closer to make myself more comfortable, resting my other leg on the outside of Tsuzuki's thigh and the other between his legs. This is better. Sip by sip, the tea disappears between his lips.
I watch him closely to see any kind of reaction. I swear I can see some colour returning to his face, to his lips particularly, and that gives me some satisfaction and relief, at least. I'm so happily surprised that the last drop of tea escapes down Tsuzuki's chin when my hand sways a little. Muttering a weak curse, I put the cup back on the floor and my other hand flies to catch the drop, in vain. I watch it disappear down his collar, leaving a wet trace on the pale skin.
I stare at that spot of wet skin and all of a sudden, find myself thinking strange thoughts. Thoughts that I hardly recognize as my own, because I would – I would never think – I would never admit to think…
I swallow and hastily wipe the liquid off with my sleeve. Did I just - want to lick it off my partner's neck? That's just – what am I thinking, at a time like this? This is Tsuzuki, Tsuzuki means *a partner*, Tsuzuki means work. Stuff like that is for some weird midnight fantasies. Not for now, when I have to make sure some ghost is not going to steal Tsuzuki's soul.
Still…
It's not like I can deny it to myself. I mean, sometimes… thinking about him. In an obscure way, you know, the way fantasies are… it's not really him, and it's not really me, in those, it's just my imagination getting out of hand. It's kind of normal, isn't it? Compared to everything else in my life, in my death, it is the most normal thing I can think of. Not like I'm gay or anything just because I sometimes think that Tsuzuki's, well, sweet. More than that, of course, but… I'm never going to tell. Mostly because it's kind of hazy to me, too. I wouldn't be able to give him a straight answer even if he asked, even if I wanted him to know. I just… wouldn't. Maybe I'm scared.
"I'm scared," I say aloud, my voice low and raw, and know that it's true. Tsuzuki looks like he's listening, silently. I grab his hand in mine, and awkwardly try to gather him closer. Finally I push off the pillows that I put to hold him up and replace them with my own body, and he's lying in my arms, and I want him there. "You hear that, Tsuzuki?" I mumble, catching his hand before it falls from his lap to the floor. "You've made me scared."
I hold his hand, tightly, almost forcefully - *flow, blood, dammit, flow through those veins and warm him up* - and finally feel satisfied. This is all that matters. I don't need much else if I have him. This is all I can give, and finally it feels it's enough.
"…on?"
What was that? I takes two attempts to drag my eyelids up enough to see Watari looking at me.
"Bon?" He smiles, cheerfully, and puts his hands on his hips. His owl is sitting on his shoulder, one eye closed but the other peering at me. "Wakie wakie."
I blink my eyes, feeling drowsy. My feet are completely dead, I don't think I can move my toes for an hour or so. I must have fallen asleep while sitting.
And holding Tsuzuki on my lap.
I hastily start shoving him back on the mattress and myself off it, feeling my face grow hot. It doesn't help that Watari is grinning like a pimp, dammit! I stumble on my feet, and Watari offers me his hand.
"I hate to disturb you, you looked so comfortable there," he smiles, actually in a pretty nice, friendly manner. "And I see Tsuzuki is gaining some colour on his face, too."
I arrange the pillows back under Tsuzuki's head, and it's true, he looks very much like himself. No longer pale, and although his eyes are shut, I bet they're not the icy colour anymore. I wish I could touch him and find out if he feels cold, but I can't do something like that with Watari peering down at me. So I straighten up and stretch my arms a little.
"Any news, then?"
"Some." Watari seems a bit tired. I wonder how long I slept, and look past Watari at the window. The curtains are drawn, and there is not a ray of light peeking through them. It must be nightfall – I got a good four hours of sleep.
"Anything on the letters?" I ask.
"Tatsumi's still working on that. He and some other people are at Harvey's mother-in-law's house right now. He said that they found one of the letters." Watari checks his watch, then pets his owl absentmindedly. It seems to have fallen asleep.
"Now, I had to wake you up before people from the Western Department arrive. I got a message from them saying they're heading over here to check on Tsuzuki. I've been brainstorming with them whole night, I think they have a pretty good idea of what we're facing here. Of course, not far from the idea I was developing myself."
"Hold on, all night? What time is it?" I ask, baffled.
Watari stretches his hands, and the owl on his shoulder moves his feet a little, not opening its eyes. "It's seventeen past five in the morning and my fingers hurt from typing! But an emergency is an emergency, right, bon?" And he winks at me.
I feel like hugging him.
He pats my shoulder and starts pushing me out of the door. "You'd better go clean up some. You definitely look like you've slept sitting up. We don't want to give the Western Department a wrong impression of us, do we?"
"How could we? You definitely look like you've spent the night working, as usual."
Watari laughs, and I go over to the small bathroom and wash my face. When I look up at the mirror, I see a puzzled-looking boy with wide eyes and sand-coloured locks of hair hanging over them, dripping wet. I look as if I've cried myself to sleep. I humph and lean down to splash some more ice cold water on my face.
"Here, bon." Watari offers me a new towel. He doesn't look weary from the long journey or from working around the clock. As a matter of fact, he looks almost excited. He leans his hands on his knees and looks at Tsuzuki. "Still no change in his condition, I take it."
I shake my head and place the towel on Tsuzuki's brow. He's been like this, *melting*, ever since I woke up. I would say he's burning with fever, but he still feels cold.
Watari walks over to the desk and opens his laptop. "Actually I kind of suspected it."
I get up and walk over to peek at the screen. "Did you find out something about that ghost?"
Watari's glasses are reflecting the screen as he clicks open a file. "The Western Department is still struggling with the case, but so far, no process. The police are at Harvey's house, which hampers our investigation." He gives me a quick look and one lock of blond hair falls over his eyes. "Bon, you have to understand that though the Western Department is pretty powerful, and they probably could end this matter with a mere snap of a finger, they can't risk bringing the soul back to where it belongs, because as far as we know right now, it could take Tsuzuki with it."
"But how can a Western ghost capture a shinigami's soul?" I demand. I'm being unfair, I know, because Watari doesn't know it any better than I do. But he always has theories.
This time is no exception. He starts frantically typing something. "Well, there is the possibility that it was a new type of yuurei, a Westernized yuurei, if you catch my meaning. Its deep love and hatred for a gaijin altered its shape and powers. Now, what might result from that kind of union ---" An old picture of a pale nun fills the screen. Watari taps the side of the keyboard. "Maybe it gave the ghost the ability to affect Japanese immortals."
"I know that picture," I tonelessly tell him and turn my back, "it's the ghost of the Borley Mansion."
"Borley Oratory," Watari corrects me. "It haunted the place for decades before its bones were found and finally put to rest. I wish we were facing something as simple as that here. Harvey's wife doesn't seek salvation or rest. It seeks revenge."
"I don't think so," I say, thinking aloud, the thought just popping into my head. "I think it's gone mad from its hatred. It doesn't know what it is doing."
"Like a yuurei, right? But something holds it." I feel Watari's eyes on me as he speaks. "The letters."
I spin around. "So what are we doing here? Shouldn't we be searching for them? What the hell did Tatsumi-san mean by 'staying put and waiting for more orders'?!" I fling my fist to the wall and grit my teeth. "No one knows what that thing is, how could they give us any further instructions?" I growl, my both hands clenched into shaking fists.
"Bon!" Watari gets up and hurries to me. I shake off his hands when he attempts to take a hold of my shoulders. "Bon, calm down. We will find a way, but we have to investigate these things carefully before acting. You wouldn't risk Tsuzuki's soul, would you?"
I sniffle and hastily wipe my nose to my sleeve, then realise that my cheeks are wet. I'm crying, and I hate it. Watari puts his hand over my head and gives my hair a gentle tussle.
"Tatsumi knows what he's doing. He called for the needed reinforcements and is currently investigating the meaning and placement of the letters. Our job right now is to guard Tsuzuki and take care of him."
"Yes, I *know*!" My voice sounds irritated and childish to my own ears. I hiccup and continue, hoping I won't sound as teary. "But there is no point in just watching and... not being able to do anything."
I'm of no use to Tsuzuki this way.
Watari just sighs and runs a hand through his hair. We stand there in silence, Watari trying to find something to say and me roughly wiping the tears from my eyes and cheeks, trying to get a hold of myself. I don't usually lose my patience like this.
I sit down on the floor next to Tsuzuki's futon and, almost against my will, look at him. His eyes have opened again, the warm purple colour paled into a dull shade of navy blue. I thought he was getting better. I thought he would wake up, but no, it's worse now than before. He no longer fights. He just lies there. I don't feel anything but cold and sadness radiating from him when I reach out my hand to close those unseeing eyes that I don't know. They will open again, I know, but then I'll just close the lids again. Tsuzuki's moving slightly, which is a surprise, even though he's just shivering a little.
"Do shinigami suffer from hypothermia?" I wonder aloud, because he looks so cold right now, the shivering somehow making it even more poignant. It's a sharp reminder that he's still alive, still in a mortal body, and the danger he's in seems all the more severe.
"It is not common," Watari replies, and I hear him typing something on his laptop. "But we must be ready to expect anything right now."
That does it then. I can't bear to see Tsuzuki like this, even his eye colour turning icy. I tuck the covers under his chin and then fetch mine, too, and throw them over my shivering partner.
"I'm going to get some tea," I mutter as I open the door. "We have to get him to drink something."
Watari murmurs something back, I bet he didn't even hear me. When he's investigating something, it's no hope trying to talk to him. He'll return back to us once he's found something, which in this case might not be much. Why do I get the feeling that we're all just sitting around, pondering endlessly over things while nothing really gets done? I rub my eyes and bite my lip, hard. Watari makes me so mad right now. When he heard that Tsuzuki is down and in need of help, he came over and started working, like this is a normal case, and what's worse, he seems *happy* to do it. Sure Tsuzuki is turning a new shade of blue each minute and he's got his soul taken by a ghost of some kind which no one seems to know nothing about, but hey, it's something new. Something *fucking* interesting to poke at and ponder over while the last signs of any kind of life flee him.
That's not what I'm going to do. I'm going to bring my partner back, and I can't do that by standing around.
I fill the cup with steaming tea and return to the room, my pace faster and my back straightened. I will do something, I have to. Watari is still working on his computer when I close the door behind me. I kneel down at Tsuzuki's side and put the cup on the floor for a while. I have to raise him up some, so I snake my arms around his chest and pull him up, then settle a few pillows behind his back to support him. His eyes have closed, but I know it won't last. He feels so cold I swear I can see frost in his hair when I tilt his head up slightly to make him swallow the tea. I've never done this before, and feel kind of awkward when I bring the cup to his lips, but I seem to do something right because I manage to get him to swallow the liquid. My hands are shaking, tired for having to reach so far and I scoot closer to make myself more comfortable, resting my other leg on the outside of Tsuzuki's thigh and the other between his legs. This is better. Sip by sip, the tea disappears between his lips.
I watch him closely to see any kind of reaction. I swear I can see some colour returning to his face, to his lips particularly, and that gives me some satisfaction and relief, at least. I'm so happily surprised that the last drop of tea escapes down Tsuzuki's chin when my hand sways a little. Muttering a weak curse, I put the cup back on the floor and my other hand flies to catch the drop, in vain. I watch it disappear down his collar, leaving a wet trace on the pale skin.
I stare at that spot of wet skin and all of a sudden, find myself thinking strange thoughts. Thoughts that I hardly recognize as my own, because I would – I would never think – I would never admit to think…
I swallow and hastily wipe the liquid off with my sleeve. Did I just - want to lick it off my partner's neck? That's just – what am I thinking, at a time like this? This is Tsuzuki, Tsuzuki means *a partner*, Tsuzuki means work. Stuff like that is for some weird midnight fantasies. Not for now, when I have to make sure some ghost is not going to steal Tsuzuki's soul.
Still…
It's not like I can deny it to myself. I mean, sometimes… thinking about him. In an obscure way, you know, the way fantasies are… it's not really him, and it's not really me, in those, it's just my imagination getting out of hand. It's kind of normal, isn't it? Compared to everything else in my life, in my death, it is the most normal thing I can think of. Not like I'm gay or anything just because I sometimes think that Tsuzuki's, well, sweet. More than that, of course, but… I'm never going to tell. Mostly because it's kind of hazy to me, too. I wouldn't be able to give him a straight answer even if he asked, even if I wanted him to know. I just… wouldn't. Maybe I'm scared.
"I'm scared," I say aloud, my voice low and raw, and know that it's true. Tsuzuki looks like he's listening, silently. I grab his hand in mine, and awkwardly try to gather him closer. Finally I push off the pillows that I put to hold him up and replace them with my own body, and he's lying in my arms, and I want him there. "You hear that, Tsuzuki?" I mumble, catching his hand before it falls from his lap to the floor. "You've made me scared."
I hold his hand, tightly, almost forcefully - *flow, blood, dammit, flow through those veins and warm him up* - and finally feel satisfied. This is all that matters. I don't need much else if I have him. This is all I can give, and finally it feels it's enough.
"…on?"
What was that? I takes two attempts to drag my eyelids up enough to see Watari looking at me.
"Bon?" He smiles, cheerfully, and puts his hands on his hips. His owl is sitting on his shoulder, one eye closed but the other peering at me. "Wakie wakie."
I blink my eyes, feeling drowsy. My feet are completely dead, I don't think I can move my toes for an hour or so. I must have fallen asleep while sitting.
And holding Tsuzuki on my lap.
I hastily start shoving him back on the mattress and myself off it, feeling my face grow hot. It doesn't help that Watari is grinning like a pimp, dammit! I stumble on my feet, and Watari offers me his hand.
"I hate to disturb you, you looked so comfortable there," he smiles, actually in a pretty nice, friendly manner. "And I see Tsuzuki is gaining some colour on his face, too."
I arrange the pillows back under Tsuzuki's head, and it's true, he looks very much like himself. No longer pale, and although his eyes are shut, I bet they're not the icy colour anymore. I wish I could touch him and find out if he feels cold, but I can't do something like that with Watari peering down at me. So I straighten up and stretch my arms a little.
"Any news, then?"
"Some." Watari seems a bit tired. I wonder how long I slept, and look past Watari at the window. The curtains are drawn, and there is not a ray of light peeking through them. It must be nightfall – I got a good four hours of sleep.
"Anything on the letters?" I ask.
"Tatsumi's still working on that. He and some other people are at Harvey's mother-in-law's house right now. He said that they found one of the letters." Watari checks his watch, then pets his owl absentmindedly. It seems to have fallen asleep.
"Now, I had to wake you up before people from the Western Department arrive. I got a message from them saying they're heading over here to check on Tsuzuki. I've been brainstorming with them whole night, I think they have a pretty good idea of what we're facing here. Of course, not far from the idea I was developing myself."
"Hold on, all night? What time is it?" I ask, baffled.
Watari stretches his hands, and the owl on his shoulder moves his feet a little, not opening its eyes. "It's seventeen past five in the morning and my fingers hurt from typing! But an emergency is an emergency, right, bon?" And he winks at me.
I feel like hugging him.
He pats my shoulder and starts pushing me out of the door. "You'd better go clean up some. You definitely look like you've slept sitting up. We don't want to give the Western Department a wrong impression of us, do we?"
"How could we? You definitely look like you've spent the night working, as usual."
Watari laughs, and I go over to the small bathroom and wash my face. When I look up at the mirror, I see a puzzled-looking boy with wide eyes and sand-coloured locks of hair hanging over them, dripping wet. I look as if I've cried myself to sleep. I humph and lean down to splash some more ice cold water on my face.