Have You Ever's and Expectations

Haku was sitting on one of the island chairs, his legs on either side of a large trash bin, hands working deftly as he skinned potatoes for the evening's meal. He had discovered an Indian dish in a multi-cultural cookbook purchased at a used bookstore in the old market district last week.

He was very excited to try it out this weekend, and hoped very much that Chihiro and Yenshi would enjoy it. The both of them had run to the store quickly for other ingredients, and within several moments he heard the lock turn and they entered, the swish and crinkle of bags in their hands.

"We're back!" He heard Chihiro call happily, swinging the door shut behind her and following Yenshi into the kitchen. Yenshi began putting away several items, making sure to leave out the ones Haku had given them on a list for their errand.

Several spices that had taken them several minutes and a few questions to uncover, and multiple types of vegetables in a variety of colors now set around Haku's bowl of potatoes on the island.

"Celery," Chihiro began, pointing in turn to different items. "Mustard seed, ginger, onions, cilantro, tumeric, radish—" Haku lifted and furrowed his brows in turn, interrupting her. "What?"

"Radish?" He then questioned. "But that's Daikon radish. I needed red radish like I showed Yenshi…." Both turned to Yenshi, who's hands were holding several items, but dead still, stopped in the middle of putting them away. Her eyes were wide as saucers, and she now attempted an innocent expression.

Chihiro giggled while Yenshi offered her apologies to Haku, but he shrugged them off and said it was all right.

Everyone was given a task for the meal after the groceries had been put away. Haku did most of the making, while Chihiro and Yenshi cut vegetables that he would add and spice accordingly.

Half an hour later the smell of Indian spices were rich and robust in the kitchen, and the cats had gathered to investigate the commotion.

"So what exactly is this meal called?" Chihiro asked Haku as she passed him the container of tumeric powder.

"Hara. Right, Haku?" Yenshi piped in, but Chihiro was teasing Yenshi before Haku could even register the question.

"Hara is the center of your chi." Chihiro pointed out flatly, and Yenshi laughed, a little embarrassedly. "You need to remember to separate life and yoga class, Yenshi." She then added with a little laugh. "You're either trying to remember too hard or your new yoga class is always in your brain."

To this the three laughed together before Chihiro posed her question again, and Haku answered, "I believe it's Masal" before ushering them out of the kitchen so he could add the finishing touches.

Later that night all sat around the living room with the TV low in the background. Chihiro and Haku both sprawled on each end of the couch, and Yenshi sitting on the floor in her pajamas, painting Chihiro's toenails and planning to add little flowers to each big toe. The events between Yenshi and Haku had now been long forgotten, and an even deeper comfort between them had grown in its place.

"I have to admit I've never been tempted to go on a blind date again." All of them were laughing hysterically at Yenshi's tale of a blind date gone awry, and several times Yenshi or Chihiro would be laughing so hard that the pedicure would have to wait, lest it look a mess.

"What is 'have you ever'?" Haku questioned them both, recalling a game that had been referenced in the story. Both Chihiro and Yenshi exchanged looks.

"Well," Chihiro then began. "It's a big middle school and high school game. Like, it goes—here I'll give you an example using you and Yenshi. OK, have you ever gotten drunk?" She then waved an arm informatively. "Now Yenshi answers yes or no, and then you answer yes or no. And we move clockwise, so now it's Yenshi's turn to ask the both of us." She raised her brows. "Does that make sense?" He nodded, and Yenshi insisted they must play.

"Haku's never played it! It wouldn't be fair to deprive him—it's such a big thing in life!" Chihiro rolled her eyes at the last comment with a chuckle, but relented to play amongst them.

"OK, Yenshi. You go first."

"Have you ever been so embarrassed it made you cry?" She said, using an old middle school classic, to which both Haku and Chihiro answered no. Haku bit his lip a moment, thinking hard on his question.

"Have you ever regretted a decision enough to change it?" Both Yenshi and Chihiro paused to think on this; a question much deeper than Yenshi's silly one prior.

"Tons of times!" Yenshi exclaimed. But Chihiro's answer was more solemn, and she answered quietly, "No." Yenshi looked at her in disbelief, but Haku gave her a pleased look. Like he knew she would have the wisdom to answer his question.

This game may lean toward immature fun and games, but Haku wasn't apt to waste his breath when there were millions of questions he wanted to ask Chihiro when he knew she would answer him with blunt honesty.

"Because decisions, good or bad, shape who you are. I may be living somewhere different, I may be doing something else with my life. Every little decision shapes you, whether only by your character, or by altering the way your life will flow until its end."

Her answer felt to Haku like a warm caress, and her answer had also made Yenshi consider, and perhaps change her mind. But it was now Chihiro's turn, and she chose something lighter in tone, which they both answered with smiles and laughter that was due.

Then Yenshi asked, "Have you ever wanted something so badly you thought you might burst?" Haku, his eyes dark, deep, said 'Yes' without any other words to follow it, and Chihiro did the same, though not with the same solemnity.

"Have you ever wanted to see the future?" Haku then asked of them, and Yenshi asked if fortune-teller's counted with a giggle. But Chihiro met his eye, knowing now that his answers were deep, contemplative, and said, "Yes, but I would never choose to."

It was her turn, and for several moments she thought long and hard on what she might ask, not wishing to follow his deep thoughts and questions with something silly, and finally she asked: "Have you ever wanted to redo something in the past?"

Yenshi stopped mid-stroke with the fingernail polish, and then finished it with furrowed brows, her hand now fanning Chihiro's toe.

"I think we'd all want to, but wouldn't…at least if we were smart." Haku agreed with a nod, and now it was Yenshi's turn, who, now taking into mind that their conversations and questions had turned serious, considered for a minute.

"Have you ever loved or cared for someone so much, you'd do anything just to be near them?" Yenshi knew the weight this question held to the two she posed the question to, and watched them with hawk's eyes.

Haku glaned at Chihiro, but without moving anything save his eyes, and Chihiro's own eyes seemed to look within her. They were unfocused, staring in the air, and Haku's eyes were intent upon her, darker then usual, focused more than seemed possible.

Chihiro's cell phone rang, causing her to start, and Haku flicked his eyes away. That moment of immense silence, of tangible stillness, hadn't been more than four or five seconds, but it had seemed an eternity.

She went into the kitchen to answer the phone which was set to beep louder and louder the more it rang, and she picked it up and took it to her ear.

"Hello?" They heard her say, followed by, "She didn't come in? OK…OK…Yeah, all right. No. No, really; that's fine." Haku wondered if his sigh was as loud as he heard it, and when Chihiro came back she grasped her jacket and keys.

"Tomoe didn't come in tonight, so they asked if I could cover just until they don't need me." She slipped her arms in her jacket sleeves and drew her hand behind her neck and under her hair so that she flipped her onyx tendrils out of her coat.

"That's not fun." Yenshi gave a distasteful look of sympathy, and Chihiro nodded with wide eyes.

"I'll see you guys later." She turned to Haku. "Thanks so much for dinner; it was great. I shouldn't be late, but don't wait up." He nodded, and she gave them a quick, closed-lip grin before dashing out the door.

Yenshi turned to Haku who was now standing up, and said, "I don't know what they'd do without her there, you know?" He didn't answer. "I'm sorry, Haku." She then said, for what is was worth, quietly.

"For what?" He turned around, and though he attempted neutrality she saw the disappointment in his eyes. She shook her head slowly at his remark, but followed him into the kitchen.

While he set the dishes in the sink of the dessert they had enjoyed in the living room Yenshi said to him, "This wasn't what you expected." His body was still, but he didn't turn to her.

"I don't know what I expected." He said with the slightest of shrugs. He hadn't even turned the kitchen light on.

"You didn't expect this." She mentioned pointedly, setting her body onto the seat of an island stool.

"How do you know what I expected?" He snapped suddenly, and she snorted, suddenly in the mood for an argument.

"I know you didn't expect the hand you were dealt," She began. "Know you didn't expect being a best friend that came into her life when she needed it. Know you didn't expect living in a city you feel out of place in. Know you didn't expect being an aspiring master chef.

"But that's what you were dealt, and I know—if even only in a smallest degree—that it hurts. That it makes you wonder, and question everything."

Haku's hands were grasping the sink, and he was leaning his weight against it, his head dropped so that she only saw his arched shoulders.

"I tried going back." He said after several moments, and Yenshi's bad attitude slid and melted. "I tried, but I couldn't. Not that I couldn't literally go back, but I couldn't make myself. I couldn't leave her—can't leave her.

"It's been eight long years of waiting to see her again. Eight long years of every minute—every second, thinking everything would be all right, that I'd be seeing her soon. It took eight long years to get Yubaba to let me leave, and I'll never forget the tears that streamed down my cheeks as I left. But they weren't tears of sadness, but of excitement, of happiness that she was just as long away as it took me to get to her.

"She's all I've ever had." And it was now that Yenshi realized he was crying. "When she came I knew I had to protect her, had to help her. She gave me my name. And she gave me the heart I had never had.

"I watched her leave. Watched her sneakers pad through the grass, her ponytail caught in the wind, her hands up as she ran. She never looked back, but I didn't take my eyes from her until they couldn't no longer see her."

It was several moments before that ensuing silence fled at more of his words, and Yenshi listened as her eyes brimmed with sympathetic tears.

"I had expectations, but wouldn't you have?" He then voiced, perhaps more to himself than for her to hear. "Every morning I awoke, hoping that by some miraculous chance I might see her face. And every night I lied in bed, the moonlight spread across me as I imagined her in my arms."

And the memory of both flew across his mind like whispers of times long ago but never a detail missing in its memory. Of his eyes wide and bright, taking in the morning sun, his hands eager for some work.  Of his midnight hair spread across the pillow, the moonlight sparkling across his bed, starlight dazzling the shape of his face, his eyes dark and solemn as he drifted into sleep.

"I could never have imagined the world that was her home. Never have imagined the size, the speed with which everything occurred, the sheer number of people…the opportunities at her fingertips or the decisions she had made.

"And so my expectations were not much until I stepped into the sprawling city of Tokyo and realized—though I pushed it away—how far away the chance of my expectations becoming reality was.

"And still I pushed it back, and little by little my hopes were dashed, until now, recently, I have truly understood that which will never be." She saw, more than heard him take a deep breath, his silhouette foreboding and sad in the light coming through the window from the street signs.

"But I still can't leave her," He said after a time, his voice quieter, seemingly less passionately but not truly. "and so I stay, anxious for a look, a smile, the touch of her hand. It is everything to me just to be within her presence.

"I waited so long for it." He added reminiscently. "And so I am more happy being near her, though so very far from her, then to leave entirely." A rush of passionate empathy coursed through Yenshi's veins, and yet she could not find words to offer comfort, no words to offer at all.

And with a sigh he said he would finish the dishes in the morning, and left Yenshi still in the kitchen, and one of the cats—a ginger one—began to paw at her feet for some leftover dinner scraps.