Sometimes it's paying a visit to a customer who hasn't paid the bill in a long while after a string of broken promises. And sometimes, it's just Gintoki filling in a shift for a Hyakka member who wants to take a night off. Either way, he complains all the way through about it when he comes down every other Monday - and Tsukuyo only gives him that nostalgic look that he can't, for the life of him, figure out what it means.
For fun this week, he flirts with some of the other courtesans who might be on shift, and they playfully bat away his advances.
"Oh, savior of Yoshiwara, I'm so flattered," one giggles, bubbly with the attention. "But really, I can't, I just can't - "
He suspects that her rebuttal may or may not have something to do with his perm. The other reason may or may not be the woman keeping a close eye on him, and he's promptly rewarded with a swift kick to his head.
"What the hell are ya doin'?" she snarls, glaring at Gintoki after picking him up by the collar of his haori. "We're here to patrol, not to harass these women on a job."
"Hey, I can't help it if I'm popular with the ladies," he says easily, and she snorts while letting him go.
"Popular, my ass," she says, and lights up her kiseru. "I bet the courtesans could tell you were easy bait 'cause they knew you couldn't get any action in real life."
At his glare, she just smirks. "Oh, did I hit a nerve? Tell me - "
"You're wrong!" he defends himself. His manhood is on the line, dammit! "In fact, I was so popular back in the day that I'd get tributes in my name."
This part was actually true. He'd been shameless about it once, back when the tide of war still favored the rebels and it still wasn't a completely hopeless cause. Sakata Gintoki, is the man, Tatsuma would say, while making him chug down as many flasks of booze in under a minute with a captive audience hanging onto his every word.
She's amused, rather than impressed. "You know they just do that to get ya even more drunk, and then hook ya into ordering drinks on the house?" There's a wry grin flashing his way that causes something in his chest to ache, but he ignores it for the time being. "It's been known ta happen once or twice."
"I can hold my drink," he insists.
"Oh?"
-x-
"I don't actually know this bar," she admits as they both slide into a booth underneath the soft sheen of the neon lights. It's not an unpopular or popular bar, but it's cheap, and sometimes when his feet leads him to the red light district, he can spend a few hours here before departing for home.
"Thought you knew every place in this joint," he says, and she rolls her eyes while lighting her kiseru. The smell of tobacco reminds him of a memory of long, long ago.
Whether it's spring or winter, once in a while I like being next to you like this and blowin' poison gas in your face. That's enough to make me happy.
Tsukuyo's voice pulls him out of his head. "They keep buildin' new ones everyday," she says, shrugging. "What they don't know is that the Yoshiwara is actually one of the most competitive places to open a business. It's becoming Edo's playground, or so they say."
The unexpected economic boom after the country turned into a republic was something no one had expected. Even the Yorozuya had been picking up more jobs than ever before, meaning that even Gintoki was kept busy for once.
She orders drinks - a plum umeshou for her, and some nice, probably bargain-basement sake for him. He can easily see the lose-lose situation looming ahead, but he's pretty sure that it's going on her tab, which is the more important thing for the moment. In fact, he's more worried about the bar owner than himself, which probably says something about him that he doesn't particularly care to analyze. He's about to warn the man himself before something more interesting turns up.
Another customer - probably in his forties, dressed in one of the tackiest outfits Gintoki has ever seen - had dropped by, sitting next to Tsukuyo. There's a moment when he scopes out the two of them, promptly disregards Gintoki with the interest of a used tissue, and turns to the Death God Courtesan.
"Yo. How's it goin'?" he asks, and it's not exactly endearing. Tsukuyo gives him the cool once-over, to assess if he's a danger to the other occupants of the bar. When she deems him as mostly harmless, her reply is polite, but frosty: "Fine, I guess."
"You live around here?" the meathead asks, and here Gintoki almost snorts in derision. This has got to be one of the most pathetic ways to pick up a woman, but he's somewhat curious to see how it plays out. The curl of a smirk on her lips is promising.
"Yeah, I do," she said, tapping her kiseru on a nearby ashtray.
"Never seen you around here before."
She's biting back a laugh. "Guess yer not too observant."
Meathead chuckles, probably a little sloshed by now. "You're funny. Can I buy you a drink?"
Careful with that, mister, Gintoki thinks. She'll dislocate your collarbone, then hurl you into the nearest vending machine, and we call that Monday.
Now Tsukuyo is a little more firm with her words, but her hand surreptiously reaches for her tantou swords, kept on her back. "Sorry, I'm not interested."
The customer's face flushes. "You're with this guy, then?"
Gintoki gives him a friendly wave and ignores the accusation, preferring to plead the fifth. "Hey, I'm Yorozuya. I do odd jobs for a living." Might as well throw it out there - he'd picked up customers in stranger ways. "I even have a business card - "
Sloshy Guy is not having it. "Whatever."
Rude, Gintoki thinks. But as soon as he's about to retort, Sloshy Guy opens his mouth again, his eyes back on Tsukuyo. "So c'mon, have a drink with me - what d'ya like drinking?"
"I said no thanks."
"You're serious. This guy?"
This isn't Kabuki-chou, where Gintoki could throw out unruly customers and no one would bat an eye. Unfortunately, this isn't his turf, which is why he just settles for a lifted eyebrow in the meantime.
"If you really have that much of an objection to his hair, I wouldn't blame ya," Tsukuyo says good-naturedly, and now there's a gleam of calculation in her eyes when she catches Gintoki glaring at her. "But even with that in mind, I'm still not interested, so why don't ya go somewhere else? Plenty of beautiful ladies here to go around, ya know."
The change of tactics causes Gintoki to blink; he's perplexed. Negotiating with losers who must've been born at the bottom of the barrel wasn't something he'd ever thought her doing. She's developed a strange sort of patience... but for what?
He doesn't have much time to ponder on it, though. Disgruntled, the customer still is at it.
"Can't believe this guy is your boyfriend."
Before anyone else can react, there's a glass ashtray that shatters the back of the customer's head. Topped off with a punch from Gintoki's fist, it's enough to slam the meathead into the ground, but he still has enough time to mourn the loss of his free drink as soon as his hand draws blood.
"As if I'd be crazy enough to date this drunk terminator!" he says, insulted, while kicking the patron out of the front door, already unconscious. He's gotta have revenge for Tsukuyo's quip on his hair; after all, his defining characteristic has been slandered all too often! "You think seven hundred and four chapters in, I'd be entitled to a sweet, nice housewife to raise my kids at the end of this series, but no! The gorilla told me I gotta live with my shitty kids until I reach forty or something!"
He can already tell that Tsukuyo's pissed off. Mission accomplished. "THAT'S YOUR ISSUE WITH THE ENDING?!"
Well, it's not like the situation is going to get any better. He tosses the bartender a few bills and whatever coins he found under the gachapon vending machine the other day.
"C'mon, let's bounce. Obviously, this joint is a cesspool," he says; she sighs, and apologizes to the bartender and other customers staring at the two of them, right before exiting the premises. He's even considerate enough to roll the meathead away from the entrance so that nobody is going to trip over him in the dark.
It's hard to tell what she's thinking at the moment, but to him, it's sort of a depressing situation that illuminates something that he's been in denial of for a long time.
Of course she's the sorta shitty woman who attracts creeps and losers. He's just known her for so long that he couldn't put two plus two together. On the outside, she's a dime piece to any asshole with a pair of working eyes, but on the inside, he just sees a regular workaholic who (still) has to learn how to play hooky.
Still, she seems relieved to be out of the situation, and they're walking aimlessly in the red light district with no thought of where to go next. All he knows is that he sure doesn't want to see someone ruining another drink of his.
"Thanks for fendin' off my admirers," she jokes, but it falls flat. The whole incident has given him a sour taste for the evening, and he's not even sure why.
"Oi. How often does that kinda thing happen?" he asks, his hands shoved in his pockets.
"What do ya mean?"
"Creeps hitting on you."
"Oh, I've lost track by now," she said, shrugging. "I used ta toss them out but now I just kinda see it as a bit of harmless fun. As long as they don't put a hand on me, they usually leave me alone after a while."
"That's disgusting."
"Hey, well, that's the kinda place Yoshiwara's for, right?" Tsukuyo takes a puff from her kiseru, blowing out smoke from the side of her mouth. "Here, you can have the unattainable, if ya can afford it."
There's a wistful, yet fond look for him when he meets her eyes, and for a moment, he wonders who the hell she's talking about.
-x-
They end up at Hinowa's shop, at the balcony of the second floor where the moon shines brightly in the zashiki room. She's having a smoke, while he's pouring himself a drink.
He's nice enough to offer her one at the risk of his own life, but thankfully, she declines. "Too much excitement in one night for me," she explains, and he can't exactly pretend he's not relieved. There's a brazier nearby, the coals still red hot, and she fixes herself a cup of hot tea instead.
With her hair down, it's a clear sign of work being over. She looks a bit happier overall. He thinks she's the kind of person to work even on her deathbed, and he's not sure whether that's freakish, or comforting in its own way. Some things will never change, and he likes that sort of consistency in a forever changing world. Two years isn't a huge chunk of time in the span of a life, but it's not exactly nothing, either.
All anyone wants from him is to be happy, but why can't he manage it? Something's missing, and he can't figure out what it is.
In the midst of their conversation - of catching up on news about the kids, upcoming restorations to Yoshiwara, or even a debate of which shojo manga happens to be Shueisha's best - she catches him frowning.
"Penny for your thoughts?" Tsukuyo asks, leaning against a wall. Half of her face is obscured by the shadow, and the other half is illuminated by the moon.
"It's nothing important," he says.
They lapse into another comfortable conversation, this time of whether Seita is ever going to learn his history properly - and she continues to smoke, before her voice trails off, growing quieter, and her replies becoming progressively shorter. Eventually, she closes her eyes while he continues to ramble on about why One Park has the best themes in Shonen Jump, tired after a full day's work, her back leaning against the wall. When he finally notices, he drinks in silence until she falls asleep, her breaths deep and steady.
After a while, he goes to her room - the futon has already been set out by Hinowa, aware of her irregular working hours - picks up the blanket, and drapes it over her carefully, so that she won't wake up. Softly, he makes his way back to Kabuki-chou not too long after.
-x-
The apartment above Otose's Snack House gets its fair share of visitors, but there was one marked absence that he hadn't missed until recently.
"Get the hell out," Gintoki says with a look of boredom, picking his nose while Sacchan falls out of the attic, flustered. It hadn't been dusted in a while, and he'd caught her hanging there from the ceiling. "Does your pizza delivery boy know that you're here?"
"Of course he does!" the kunoichi puffs out, miffed, and pulls herself from the ground. "I just wanted to make sure of certain things, that's all!"
Gintoki isn't even sure what the hell she's on about, but one thing is for sure: That shiny rock resting on her ring finger is one of the most hideous things he's ever seen. He'd heard Tae's envious mutterings about it, that it wasn't quite fair that such a vulgar woman is the first in their group to get ahead of the rest of them. But then again, she always had a bit of a competitive streak.
"Well, beat it," he says. "Or do I have to run a truck over you again so that you get the message?"
"Oh, Gin-san," she purrs. "Always the sadist in you. I know there was a good reason why I was in love with you for years ~ "
"Shut up and get to the point," he interrupts her.
"Hmmph." She pushes her glasses up, and plops herself on the couch. "So impatient, tsk tsk."
She waggles a finger, as if to scold him, a grown ass adult, like a little boy. In a matter of seconds, she's transformed from adoring ex-stalker to somebody's mother-in-law.
There's an authoritative air in her voice that makes him think she's been a teacher's pet once, maybe in a past life. He's not sure why this is jarring with this previous image he's had of Edo's number one assassin, but hey, stranger things have happened.
"You know, when I gave Tsukki my blessing to die between someone's legs a while ago, I fully expected her to do absolutely nothing about it." There's a crafty glint in Sarutobi's eyes that Gintoki is not interested in dissecting at the moment. "But as for you... You're the one that's eventually supposed to make a move, dammit! You think I'd hand you over to some random wench? After 699 chapters, three movies, and a friggin' time skip?"
"What delusional nonsense are you talking about?"
She whips open Volume 55, to chapter 493. "This part, okay! When there's a woman I really want to make a move on, I can't do it like I normally do. We're not in the Sazae-san format anymore, ya know! People change!"
"I don't know what the hell you're talking about," Gintoki says bluntly. "Do you expect me to remember everything that happens in a manga series with over seven hundred chapters?"
Sacchan sighs deeply, and pinches the bridge of her nose. "I know you're not this stupid. Tell me you're just being dumb on purpose."
"I am that stupid for letting you stay in my house for this long," Gintoki agrees, and then hurls the ninja fifty feet from his window.
"Congratulations on your engagement," he calls out, spotting her head popping out of the nearest garbage can, gasping for air, and then he slams the window so hard it almost smashes into a million pieces.
-x-
Takasugi comes again like a cat, slinking into his dreams unbidden.
"Didn't expect you to be into whorehouses, Gintoki," he says. His eye is bandaged this time, his purple yukata fluttering in the wind. The butterflies embroidered almost seem like they're moving.
"Wasn't," Gintoki replies.
A shivery laugh sends tingles down his spine. "You remember when we first went to Gion? Tatsuma promised to show us a good time."
The raid in Kyoto had gone pretty damn well - so well, in fact, that one of the feudal lords who'd financed the war had allowed the Four Heavenly Kings to do whatever the hell they wanted after they won a battle. They'd been around eighteen at the time - Sakamoto freshly turned nineteen - and still were adjusting to the rhythm of adulthood.
"Don't remind me," Gintoki says, but it's a futile cause.
They're on the boat again. Takasugi places his fingers on the shamisen again as if he's deciding whether to play a delicate tune, before he stops moving them entirely.
"We picked the same courtesan," Takasugi said, smirking. "And she decided on me."
"And then you passed out because you were too nervous to do the deed," Gintoki snapped. "So in the end, I was the real winner. You lost."
Now his friend looks at him, a gaze so focused and long that he can feel it pierce into his soul. "Yes, that's right. I did lose," Takasugi says, in a voice so soft that Gintoki doesn't ever remember him using, except the moments when he was clinging on the last vestiges of life, resting in his arms. "Right until the very end."
The smoke from Takasugi's pipe, momentarily placed on the edge of the ashtray, curls into a gray wisp.
"What do you want from me?" Gintoki asks, in a strangled whisper. "Do you want me to say sorry? You know I've been sorry ever since that day."
Sorry I couldn't protect you. Sorry I broke our promise. Sorry that I had to kill you, right when you were almost on the edge of finding a reason to live again. Sorry I couldn't reach out to you in time.
He might as well choke on his apologies for all the good they did for him. That's why he never says them out loud anymore.
Now Takasugi turns his head, and says, "Wake up, Gintoki."
And he does.
-x-
He lifts the manju buns out of a plastic bag, places them on the grave, and sighs deeply.
It's clean as a whistle. He supposes one of the Kiheitai must have gotten to it before he did. Maybe Matako was up to it?
"Granny, this better work," Gintoki grumbles. "They've been raising the prices in the Eights-Twelves for the steamed buns. You can't even get a proper snack for a one hundred yen coin anymore!"
"What's supposed to work?"
He tilts his head and sees Tsukuyo, behind him.
Fuck.
"I, uh... "
She blinks, waiting for an answer, and he curses inwardly. He can tell it's her day off - she's wearing a more casual haori draped over her usual black kimono, with the orange maple leaves near the bottom. Not to mention, her hair isn't pinned up today.
"I was just... in the neighborhood," he finishes lamely, and thankfully she doesn't push the subject any further. It's one of the nicer things about her, compared to the rest of the ensemble cast. She minds her own business - most of the time, anyways.
"I see," Tsukuyo says, and now he notices her hand carrying a small watering pot.
He slowly puts two plus two together. "I guess you were doing a bit of gardening."
"Something like that, yeah."
He wonders if she can read the name on the gravestone, and almost wants to cover it with his body before realizing how ridiculous it would've been. Still, it's not like he doesn't have the instinct to pull himself out of this sticky situation.
"Can I see?"
Surprisingly, she's amiable to his question. "Sure."
She turns around and swiftly leads the way.
It's surreal that he eventually ends up in front of Jiraia's grave. It's engraved with his birth name - Tobita Danzou, in gold lettering. Other words are written after it.
Brother.
Teacher.
Loyal retainer.
Psychopathic fuck, Gintoki adds inwardly, but there's something soft in Tsukuyo's eyes when she kneels down to water the small purple orchid. Enough to stir something deep inside him, something warm and close to...
"Pretty, isn't it?" Tsukuyo's voice interrupts his train of thought. "They don't need that much water. I had ta check out a book in the library, to figure it out at first, but I'm getting the hang of it."
"Not bad," he concedes.
She straightens up after she places the watering can on the ground. "I shouldn't interrupt your stay. I was about to leave, anyways."
He nods, and then a thought occurs to him.
"Hey, Tsukuyo... "
She stops. Turns her head. "Yeah?"
"Do you... do you ever dream about him?"
There's a pause while she considers it. "From time to time, yeah."
a/n: For those wondering about the manju buns, Gintoki is trying to pay respects to Takasugi's ghost, hoping that his spirit won't haunt him anymore.
Also, yes. In chapter 699, Sacchan does tell Tsukuyo that she has to die between someone's legs, but of course Tsukuyo tells her that she's not going to do that. LOL. In my honest opinion, Sacchan will never stop loving Gintoki - but I think she has a very interesting sense of pragmatism whenever she's choosing not to be delusional (especially in SA arc and the fleeting moments she shares with Zenzou.) I've always interpreted her as a spunky type of girl who, if she doesn't get what she wants, is determined to be the happiest of all, and isn't content to wallow away in pity which contrasts in comparison to many of the other smoking tsunderes of Gintama.
Credit to Game_Changer, who's parody of 7-11's I ripped off shamelessly and made into Eight Twelves.