'He has such tiny hands.' I notice this as I watch him clean his sword, performing his ritual of daily mantenence, as he always does. It's more out of boredom than anything that I'd even pay attention, but the motions have me hypnotised, and I just can't seem to stop analyzing it.
He must hate having to polish his sword, I suppose. It's too much of a reminder of his past. But Kenshin seems to be a masochist like that. He's the kind of guy who draws inward and punishes himself for things he no longer has control over. He pisses me off like that sometimes.
He flips the sword, and carefully, expertly runs the tattered rag over it, with his delicate slender fingers. God, he does have small hands. I'd never paid much attention before.
They seem so weak, so innocent, like a woman's or a child's. They put off the illusion that they could never have been stained by the blood of other men... hundreds of other men.
We both know it's not true.
He looks up and smiles, as I lean back and chew a piece of grass, and we share a moment of sincerity and falsness, in which we both try to pretend there's nothing bottled up inside, when I know inwardly, he's still slowly killing himself.
"Itai." He barely whispers, when in an uncharacteristically clumsy moment, he drifted, and cut his finger on the reversed blade. Without speaking, I lean toward him and wrap my bandana around it to stop the bleeding and without speaking, he silently says thank you with his guilty smile.
We sit in silence for a moment, and stare at nothingness, until he politely motions that I've still been holding onto his hands. I smirk and let go as though it was an accident, but I really want to hold on just a little longer, trying to contemplate that paradox within his innocence and malice.
He has such tiny hands...