TW - Graphic material

I'm stronger now, much stronger, and I'm happy about how big my bicep is when I flex. I don't feel skinny anymore, I feel lean. I feel like a fighter. My feet are bigger than yours, and so are my hands. I didn't realize that they would do that. When I was a kid, it was all about catching up to you, getting as tall and as big as you; it never really hit me that I might surpass you in size.

I'm gonna' have another growth spurt soon, I can feel it, but I already think I have more muscle strength than you. I could hold you down and beat you up, I'll bet, but I never will. I could probably hit you really hard, but I never will. I could probably treat you real bad, but I'm not gonna'. That's why I wanted to be a man. I want to be strong, stronger than you, so I can show you that it's possible to have power but still be a good person, that good men exist. I have to show you that even when I'm bigger than you, I can still treat you the same as I always did. I'm gonna' prove to you that even though there's bad guys out there, I'm not like that. I'm different. I'm not gonna' change.

You can trust me on that.

I walk next to you now, and you walk next to me. I like it like this. Your face is pretty much level with mine, and you're close enough that I don't have to be loud when I talk, I don't have to shout against the wind because I'm not behind you anymore.

I pick the path as often as you do, and sometimes we don't even decide out loud, almost like our feet are just somehow heading in the same direction without us having to think about it. It's nice.

I'm a lot taller than I was. I've gotten older, I've gotten taller, but you've stayed the same, almost like you're waiting for me to catch up. You don't change. Since I've met you, you haven't changed a bit, not even your hairstyle.

Me on the other hand, I've changed a lot. I've got an adam's apple, my voice dropped, my jaw is sharper, and I notice I've got a broader chest. I can't see my ribs anymore like I used to. My legs are a lot longer, my feet are bigger - I grew so much over my summers of being fourteen and fifteen that there are stretch marks on my sides. I'm definitely not a beefy guy, but I'm muscled and lean. I've trained hard for this.

My face hasn't gotten much better. I don't have baby fat in my cheeks anymore, and my eyes seem more slanted, my brow's harsher, and my nose is longer. I mostly just get acne on my shoulders and not my face, thank god, but I still feel ugly. I look in the river and I see a lizard looking back. I hate it. I still look like a lizard… but it's a lizard that could fuck up some faces real good. Maybe a Komodo dragon. That's what's important. I look tough, and I am.

I don't grow hair on my jaw, but I get it in other places. It's not the best. It's itchy and it traps sweat, but it's not unbearable. I have growing pains still, even at seventeen, especially in my legs. My voice finally quit that annoying cracking thing a couple years ago. I wake up hard a lot too, and it freaks me out, because I still find myself waking up tangled around you even though I don't remember going to sleep that way. I hope you don't see the stains at least. I think I might die of embarrassment.

Luckily, the other guys talk about morning wood sometimes, so I don't feel like some weird freak who might be feeling you up at night or something. I guess it happens to everyone. Well, obviously not everyone. Not to girls. That would be dumb. Still, it's annoying to wake up and have that staring me in the face. Like no, I was sleeping, why aren't you sleeping? Get the fuck out of here.

It gets under my skin a little to know this is happening to me, because I've known, I've known for a while what you actually do with those men, and it horrifies me. What the fuck kind of torture have you been putting yourself through and for how long, going to bed with these creeps? All the money in the world wouldn't be worth that, and you're doing it for hardly enough to feed yourself with. What's worse is that I'm waking up hard all the time and I feel like I'm finally turning into one of those guys. Some part of my mind is telling me that it's the first step towards becoming what I hate most.

I'm sure I won't change, and even though this is what I wanted so badly, I'm a little worried about coming of age. Will I change once I'm a man all the way? If I whack off too much am I gonna' look at you and start wanting to undress you?

Fuck, I dunno'. Weird thoughts, Ikkaku. Quit thinking about your dick already.

I'm so full of steam. I have too much energy to burn off and it makes me feel bad sometimes, because I'm old enough to realize that I shouldn't drag you around with me. You don't have a fire in your gut to give you the energy to do those things all day, all the time. When I was younger, I'd beg and beg until you played with me, but now me and you will separate sometimes and I'll meet with friends who share that fire. I like to give you a break from me. I know I try your patience a lot.

I feel my blood pumping. I'm ready for violence. I'm ready for life. I feel capable and old enough to do these adult things, to fight to the death. I'm not of legal age, but I want these to fight anyways. Hatachi is still years away from me, but I want to prepare.

I can't fucking sit still. I've gotta' be moving or I start itching all over. You talk much more than you used to now, and your voice is pretty much the only thing that calms me down. When I'm dying to be out there looking for another fight, you'll ask me if you ever told me the story about the boy who came out of a peach and defeated a fort of oni on a distant island. Of course I have to stay and hear. Before I know it, it'll be nightfall and I'll have made it through a day without bloodshed. I love being told stories; it can be from anyone, but yours are the best.

I don't beg you to play anymore, I'm not a kid. I got me some self-control. We play cards a lot though. You got me them for my fifteenth birthday and I've kept them nice. Cards, those are the kind of games you can stand, where you don't have to move around much and can still rest while beating me blind. You're the one who taught me gambling, and I'm not good, at least against you. Probably because you can read my face so well that you can tell when I'm bluffing. I can never read you, though. It's fucking impossible to see something on your face if you don't want it to be there.

I'm surprised how many nights you'll let me take up your time when I know you'd rather be out working and gathering more money to later feed us with. It gets harder each time for me to let you pay for me, and I've been getting enough off my opponents that I can pay for myself most of the time now. I'm glad you still make time for me anyway and will sit around a fucking campfire with a skinny teenager when there are probably smarter, more interesting people around that could take up your nights. Yeah right, smarter people, out here? Maybe it's possible, but probably not.

You teach me all the games you know, and then how to count cards, which is the real trick of poker. You're real good. I've seen you play for real in the bar before, and you tell me to go sit behind someone else, because my poker face is bad and if I look at your cards I'm gonna' give shit away, so I listen, but damn, can you play well. I wonder why you don't gamble instead of selling your body. When I ask how you got so good, you say someday you'll teach me how, and I try hard to learn. You tell me if you remember where the cards are, the cards of others, who has what, what's been played and add them up in your head, you can start to eliminate and guess what people will draw and what it's likely that they have in their hand. You can start to not completely rely on luck, and have an advantage. You tell me that poker is a game that gives intelligence the advantage, but every so often, someone with crap skills can still win through sheer luck, which is why people loves the game. Everyone thinks poker is purely a game of luck and odds, and you like to keep it that way, because it draws in more suckers.

Maybe I'm like that with fighting too. If a guy thinks that just because he's bigger and stronger than me, that he'll win, that it's a predetermined fact of nature, it's a lot easier for me to beat him, cause' he'll let his guard down. My skill, I want my skills to become so great that it won't matter how strong my opponent is.

I fucking love winning. I'm the best around. I brag to you about beating someone when I'd been out with my friends and you weren't there to see it. I talk a lot of shit, and I wonder why you tolerate me yacking in your ear, because it's not like you talk about your day endlessly to me. No, you don't tell me to give it a rest, you just turn to me and look in my eyes and say 'did I ever tell you the one about the rabbit in the moon?' The story still doesn't make sense to me, but I like listening anyway. Still I wonder, why would he jump in the fire?

I don't know when it struck me over my endless hours pondering how close I am to adulthood, but what will happen when I reach that? What'll happen when I grow up? I'm sure that it's not this sudden thing, since we age at the same rate our whole lives, but it's a state of mind, and I'm sure it'll occur to you too. What will happen when I grow up? Will you suddenly realize that we've been together too long and decide that it's time for you to move on? Will you tell me one day that I can't sleep in bed with you, will you turn to me and tell me I'm too old for this? That I have to make my own life?

I don't… I don't feel like I'm a tag-along, but maybe that's how you still see me, that kid still following behind you.

I wonder if when I'm officially an adult, when I'm all the way grown, you'll send me off on my own. Would I want to go? I don't think so. It's not that I'm fixed on staying, or against leaving, it's just that I'm here with you and you're here with me and we have a good friendship, and why break that? I feel like maintaining that. It's not that I'm the one who is like 'I'll hang around and see what happens'. You're not thinking that either, probably. We just do shit.

I don't have future plans really, and I don't think you do either. We've got nowhere in particular to be or go, so why not stick together? Why change? I can't even fathom our friendship ending. Literally, it's not even something that I fear will happen, I just can't imagine it happening. We're parts of each other.

Yeah, this isn't temporary. When I grow up, I'm not suddenly gonna' wanna' walk some other way and you're not gonna' do that either. I'm sure we'll stick together for a good long time. I'm gonna' make sure that you know me as an adult for a lot longer than you knew me as a kid. You'll think of me as a man when my name comes to your mind, not the kid you saw grow up.

Damn, you're so pretty. I feel like I notice more now that I'm older. Of course, I don't want to… to stick it in or anything, but I can definitely appreciate your beauty more, especially now that I can fully understand what it means for you to be the prettiest one out here. That takes resilience. That takes guts. Beauty that survives out here has to be strength. God, you're pretty, Yumichika. How do you do it?

Your hair especially. I'm not a kid anymore and I should have impulse control, but sometimes when you're not paying attention and I'm sure you can't see, I'll touch just a little. You probably can't even feel it when I do it. I know you don't like those other men touching your hair, but you let them. I won't treat ya' like them. I can be gentle. I'll never yank.

Even if you hate those guys you go to bed with, I think that you must want to be touched. I want to give you friendly touch so that maybe you'll be satisfied with that and not look for others. I hope it feels different with me than it does with them. It's different, because they don't love you.

You and I bought me a sword when I turned fourteen, a quality sword. Oh my god, I don't think I'd ever been happier about something in my life. When I first held that thing in my hands, I just knew this was the key, this was the thing that would unlock so many doors, so many ways for me to become stronger. It was… It was so beautiful. The blade was so sharp, and I still haven't had to sharpen it even once. I had my sword then, and you picked one off of a dead man for yourself. Times were great.

You talk and talk to me today - god, how I love to fuckin' gab for hours. It calms me down so much. We talk about the moon and June and fuck all else and we don't stop until we fall asleep, and then we do it again the next day. I need that. I'm so hyper, I'm so pent-up and full of energy that I can hardly hold still. There's a fire in my blood. I have to find something more to this life. I want to kill, I want to win, I want you to see me succeed. Your voice grounds me, your stories slow down my brain and give me something productive to think about. You're soothing, an anchor, and you smile so much now. You smile at me like I'm a shining star, and I can't look away. I have to keep burning bright and stay worthy of your approval, I have to give you a reason to keep smiling.

I couldn't bear it if I grew up to become a man, only to see that you've found that I'm just like the rest of them. I have to be something better, and I will be. I'll make something of myself, I promise.

The first time I deliberately killed someone in battle, I was sixteen. The fight felt good, but it didn't feel good when I put the point of my sword against his chest and thrust it in and he abruptly dropped. It took me right back to the night I knifed that guy in the back when he picked you up and threw you down like you were nothing.

That time, killing someone in a real battle, I didn't lay awake traumatized for days like I did the first time, but it sure didn't feel good remembering how I could feel the resistance of the skin and bone and meat against my blade, or the heavy pressure I'd had to use to stab… That sure didn't feel good, seeing him so surprised, seeing his eyes go dark so fast.

No one can tell me that the dead look peaceful.

We battle a lot, you and I against each other, and I enjoy this. I hold back, and I hate holding back normally, because if I hold back I cannot improve, but with you it's okay. I don't want to fight you until either of us is so hurt that we can't stand, I don't want to fight you to the death. I like our wins and losses against each other to be equal, so I only fight you for fun, a different kind of fun than the others. It makes me really happy to fight with you. Fight doesn't even sound like the right word, because that makes it sound vicious and serious and mean. It's not like that at all. It's so different from how it is with my real opponents.

I wonder if it's like that for you and the men you sleep with. All men are the same to you, but I'm a different kind of man in your eyes. I mean, aren't I? I understand that I've gotten big now, that I'm strong and I could hurt you. I could hurt you, but I won't ever fucking do that. I'll never hurt you, Yumichika. You know that, right? You know that.

I meet a girl.

She laughs like bells and I have to chase her, because she runs. When I slow down and almost let her get away, she stops and turns to look at me and laughs some more, and I start chasing again. The women around here don't wanna' be caught. They always run, because if they're caught, they get messed up. This girl doesn't run like she wants to get away, and when I finally nab her, she doesn't scream. It surprises me that she doesn't try to escape. What do I do now? I caught her.

Maybe now it's time to let go.

I loosen my grip, but she doesn't worm her wrist out of my hand or scream for help. I must look young enough that she's not too scared. I think she's my age. Her hand's so small in mine. I feel like I could break her, but I don't. I feel funny inside.

I kiss her. She's soft.

I'm so hungry for a fight. I wanna' fight so bad that I think I'll explode. I've taken to slashing at tree-trunks when we're cooling down for the evening, sitting around our fire, and getting ready for sleep. I cut the wood until there's no bark, and sometimes I see how high I can get a slice. You tell me to lay down when I get too over-zealous and send woodchips flying backwards towards your feet.

I can't, I can't lay down. I tell you that I don't wanna' go to sleep. I can't sit still, I say. I want to prowl the streets. I feel like a wolf. I need to howl and run and hunt. I want to bite into something. I want to dig my fingernails into the ground. There's a fire in my blood and I can't put it out. There will be no sleeping.

You teach me how to meditate that night, and at first it's really hard and I think it's stupid. I can't do it, and it's hard, so it must be fucking stupid. I write it off and tell you it's a pile. You just look at me blandly as I rant about how this isn't gonna' help me. I don't know what I'm supposed to be thinking about, what's the point of breathing and focusing my energy? This is dumb, I tell you, trashing your idea, but without breaking your gaze, you calmly tell me that to be a skilled fighter, I must have patience and discipline. The fire that burns too hot goes out too quickly, and I need to burn slowly for a long period of time, heating up with close control. I have to balance power with control, have determination and diligence, or else I'm a waste of blood, you say.

Shame boils within me, and I know you're right. Fuck.

I try hard. I don't want to see that look on your face again, like you can't believe how weak and impulsive I am that I can't sit still for longer than a minute. I hold both ends of my sword and fold my legs. I put my back straight against a tree-trunk and take a deep breath, letting my spine flatten onto the wood, then I let it out, my eyes falling closed with it.

I want to become a man. I repeat this over and over and focus on that intention. I do this every night now, and I start noticing that I'm thinking quicker in battles. I dodge something that I shouldn't have seen coming, but it had been clear to me. I can pick up more tells from the way a person stands before a battle and I'm not so clouded by excitement and adrenaline.

I'm getting better each time with every fight, I just know it.

I make some new buddies and have been hanging out every night this week with them, causing trouble, normal shit that young people do, thinking we're cool. I come home and you have a boyfriend with you. Not a playmate, but a lover. It's not new, but it hasn't happened in a while. I don't get a good vibe off of him, but I don't say shit, because he's got half-way decent manners at least.

I'm not gonna' give you guys my fucking blessing or anything, cause' I'm not your dad and I don't like these situations or these people, but I say something like, 'do what you want.' Maybe I say congratulations once, and we drink together. This guy isn't completely awful, I decide. He sticks around for maybe a month and I'm getting used to him.

Only problem is that you wanna' talk to him instead of me now, and it bugs me more than it did when I was younger. When I was little I'd just be openly jealous and pull your arm to make you pay me attention, and you'd tolerate it, but now I feel bad about bothering you guys. You're happy, so I go out more often with the guys. That just seems to push us apart a little more every day though.

One time I wake up holding you on one side while he's holding you on the other, and I feel fucking sick. Maybe I do need to go off on my own and leave you two be, because this is just too weird. I know you're not gonna' replace me, so I don't have to cling on so tight. We can just spend a little more time apart, but that doesn't mean we're splitting up. I'm secure in that knowledge like I am with nothing else. I know that I'm not being replaced, that I have nothing to fear. I know that, so why does it hurt anyway?

This is the last real lover you ever have. He looks nice, actually. His face isn't unbearable and he makes you laugh, my god, he makes you laugh. I try not to hang around or butt in when you two're talking, because I know now that you guys want private time together. When I was a kid, I was too fucking oblivious to know when to fuck off somewhere, but I get the hint now.

This is what you want, and you deserve love and happiness. Anything your heart desires, you must have, Yumichika. I want you to have happiness. I never want to see you lying despondent like you were that day again.

Deep down I know it won't last, and of course, it doesn't.

I beat him absolutely senseless. I had trusted another one, another one of these fucks with your heart, and he'd betrayed that. I'd let him do what he'd pleased, I'd trusted that he was a good man, but they never are. I'd hoped for your sake that he'd been different.

"Look what you got!" I scream, shaking him hard, turning him to face you. "Look what you mother-fucking got!" You watch for a moment and then turn away in a daze, walking away. I knock his teeth in and tell him he's lucky that I don't kill him. What a pathetic piece of shit, what a brain-dead bastard to not realize how lucky he'd been to have you.

I'm sick of seeing you love people so hard, thinking they're different from the others, and then having them take you for granted. How could anyone be graced with your time, your laughter, and your love and not think themselves the luckiest person in the world? How can they toss you aside? What are you doing wrong? I don't understand why they all seem to think you deserve this.

Yumichika, don't look for other men. I will never do this to you. Let me be your man. I'll be the only man in your life, and you'll never feel this pain again. You can be happy, and you won't even have to sleep with me. You can be happy and not just for a little while. Let me be the only man you give notice to; I'll never let you hurt.

You spend a day sitting at a riverbank, just staring at the water. I sit with you. I don't try to talk to you. I wonder if you know I'm there.

It's silent, but all I can hear and feel is a heart so broken that its pieces could sand a beach.

Yeah. I was right about that guy just like I was about the others. I know what's best for you, and that's to avoid men altogether. Why not make friends and have them actually be friends for once? Why do you look for that kind of awfulness? Surely it doesn't make you feel better for even a minute. You're messed up inside if you even hope that it will. You're messed up, but I know better. I know better and I won't let you do this to yourself.

Why? I wonder that every time I see it happen. Why are you always around men who treat you bad? Maybe I'd had this delusion when I was younger, but I'd seen you as some sort of high-class person who would've cut down anyone who disrespected him. You had dignity, I thought. You were the person who taught me not to take shit from people, but I notice now, all you do is take people's shit.

Why do you let them do it? What puzzles me even more is that I don't know how they even could treat you bad. You're funny and smart and beautiful. Why do they seem to hate you? I still don't get why they do it, but they'll walk past you and spit.

Now, I don't know about anyone else, but fucking spitting on someone is unacceptable. That's the most low-down disrespectful thing, no matter how mad I get, no matter how much of a dick the other person is, there's gotta' be some decent human respect. I ain't so far above the human race that I could look down at someone and spit on them, not even the ground at their feet. Spit is reserved for scum, and I won't do it to anything more than scum.

But they do it to you. They think you're such garbage that they actually spit. They walk past you and sneer, they laugh, they call you things and try to touch you like there's an open invitation on your body, like there's something on your pretty face that tells them that you deserve to be treated horribly. What makes you different from any other guy walking around here?

Does beauty just do that to people?

If it's because you're a prostitute, then it makes even less sense for them to treat you bad. They're the ones that come to you for some lovin'. It's not like you're the only one who's laying down and doing something dirty. They don't get to act so pure, like you're the one that's messed up. They're the same men who seek you out once night falls. The fact that they're so broken down and desperate that they have to actually pay someone to go to bed with them should be enough to wake them up to the fact that they're not worth anyone sleeping with them willingly, so they shouldn't be doing it at all. If they have to pay, trick someone, or drug them to 'get lucky', if they think they're 'getting lucky', they know damn well they don't deserve to do what they're doing.

I've heard that 'is it rape or theft' joke probably a hundred times. One thing I've learned from you about prostitutes, is that they're people. Those girls can really put liquor away, and if they know I'm not after them for that one thing, they stop with the fake laughter and treat me real sweet - in a genuine way too. Good drinking partners, those girls, and much more lovely when they wipe that paint-shit off their faces. 'Rape or theft', my ass. It depends on whether those men are seeing a person or a thing.

It's just as well, because I wouldn't even treat garbage as badly as they treat you. You're careful to not let me see most of the time, but I know. I know what's happening.

When I was younger and I saw you get spanked that time, of course, I didn't really get what had happened or why he'd done it, but by seventeen, when a man spanks you, I kill him. I find him later at night when you're asleep in the grass somewhere, and I kill him. It wasn't hard. I just provoked him into a fight, and after a few rounds I socked him in the jaw so hard that his head snapped around. He was a lousy fighter. Looks like he could hit your butt, but not hit me.

You might let that shit slide, but I'm not gonna'.

When I'm not focused on fighting or on training, that's what consumes my mind. I'm becoming obsessed with the thought. I look at the men carefully now when you talk to them, and I feel funny inside. This is the person who will go off with you somewhere and you two will undress and join together. Why with that guy, I wonder. Is there something special about him? What gives you the strength to do it if there really isn't anything special there at all?

I don't want you to have to be strong enough to do that. I don't want you to do that ever again, but you do it again and again and again and again and I can't even keep track of how many it must be. I'm always thinking about what I can do for money. You haven't stopped going to other men, and I know better now.

You lay down with men for money. It's not just kissing, and I've known for a long time. You let them see you naked and touch you there. You let them put it inside. You let them inside, and it doesn't matter who, as long as they can pay.

When I kill men in battle, I look over the body for money now. I always do, and I save it carefully. I offer to buy us our food, but you tell me 'no, no, you worked hard for that and you should keep it.' You think I should have spending money for alcohol or fireworks or whatever it is that young men want. A hooker, maybe. Yeah right. You don't let me buy food for you, but you'll use your hard-earned money to pay for the both of us. I bring up that point, and you say it's your money and you'll do what you want with it.

Can't you see that's the same thing? I'm not a kid who needs pocket-money. I'm trying to help you, and not out of obligation. Let me help you out of this bad situation, damnit.

I start to realize that I can hold out my hand to pull you out of the pit all I want, but you're the one that has to grab on. That makes me feel frustrated and fucking helpless, and it drives me mad. I'm gonna' find a way to force you to grab on. I won't let you keep doing this.

When I got called names as a kid, you never told me 'they're wrong.' You never told me that what they said wasn't true, you never told me that I wasn't what those kids used to call me. You never told me they were wrong, but that's what you taught me, to prove them wrong.

'Bitch, slut, pretty-boy, twink, fag, cum-dump, harlot, whore, whore, whore.' I could go on. I've always had a foul mouth, but I quickly learned which words you were not going to let me say near you, even if I was talking about other people. I learned how to refer to a woman the right way, I learned how to insult girls without crossing that line of respect, I learned how to have a foul but acceptable mouth around you, and when I hear those words from other people, aimed at you, it sends off this explosion in my chest, this high-pitched scream in my brain, because it's so inherently wrong. You aren't those things, Yumichika. 'Whore' isn't your name. You told me from the beginning that you weren't those things and that I wasn't allowed to call you that or even say the words while you could hear. You aren't those things, and I don't wanna' hear other people calling you that either. That's not your name. That's not what you are.

You taught me to prove my bullies wrong, but why won't you do that for yourself?

With me, you were just correcting me, because you knew I didn't really think you were those things when I said those words, and I learned real fast that you were right, that wasn't what I meant. But with them, they mean it. They mean it, and someone should set them straight. You should set them straight.

You ain't no whore, Yumichika, you aren't cheap. You're worth more and you deserve better. You're the most beautiful person in the world and you deserve to be treated like it. Don't do this to yourself.

You're the one who taught me self-respect, but you don't practice what you preach when it's you. When it's concerning yourself, you just take it, you just accept it and put up with it. How long are you gonna' let this go on?

Well, I'm not gonna' let it go on.

I learn right away not to interfere directly, and you admit to me what you do. There's a difference between being positive that I know something and having it confirmed. I know for sure now, and it just makes me feel sick. I can't believe I'm not allowed to kill them, that you're just gonna' spread your legs and that I have to know that you're doing it. I don't have to hear or see, but I still know that you're doing it and I want to throw up.

Why don't you fight these circumstances harder? You taught me not to lie down and take it when someone's messing with me, but that's exactly what you do. You lie down and take it - oh fuck, I'm gonna' hurl. Yumichika, please, please come away with me and see that the world can be beautiful. That's what you taught me. You taught me that life can be more, and I want you to have more. I want you to have so much fucking more than a hooker's life. You have to want it too. Why don't you? I don't get why you don't want it bad enough to save yourself. Fight, please!

I get that it's a long-held habit, something you probably resolved yourself to doing and that your mind probably doesn't let you see a way out of it anymore, but there are ways out. I know so. I know better and I have to make you see that.

I think about other ways - other ways that we could make enough money for us to eat, but you don't want to listen to that. You just want to continue as you are, even though it's been tearing you apart for years. Maybe you're addicted to that. Maybe you can't stop. I'm not one of those idiots who think people secretly enjoy rape, but I feel like part of you wants to keep going back one more time. Just maybe, you can't stop, maybe you feel fulfilled for a minute but it goes cold once it's over. Maybe.

You're right, though. It's not my decision, and I can't control anyone's decisions but my own. I try, but I can't in the end. You act differently around me now, and I can see that you're ashamed that I know.

Yumichika, you could roll in this filth for eternity. I don't think you're dirty. You just do dirty things. You can stop whenever you want to. You can wash off the outside and be the person you are inside, the person who doesn't actually want to do these things. I don't think you're dirty.

It's just… I thought you were better than that.

Maybe that's what adult life is like. Maybe it's something I should just give in to as an inevitability. Maybe sexuality is just a part of human nature, maybe this impulse is what keeps animals like us alive. Maybe I should accept that love is just chemical sabotage that ensures that offspring will survive. Love wasn't real, love was never real.

Fuck that. If it's not real, why do I feel so awful inside when I see you in pain? Yumichika, I would kill them. I would kill them for you and you could take their money before having to lay down with them. I would do it, if only you would ask, if only you would let me. I would slay the world.

I don't understand, and I'm glad I'm not the young boy who thinks that you'll protect me if I make myself really small behind you. I can stand and protect myself, and I could protect you too, maybe. I can stand up and not take backtalk if I don't want to. You taught me that. You taught me not to lay down and show my belly, not to take other people's shit. You taught me to stand up for myself, but here you are just giving up, and that, I will never understand.

I slowly realize that you've resigned yourself to this. You're not going to change. I can't force you to, and I won't try to anymore. The only thing to do is accept your decision, although I don't agree or respect that decision. I try not to pay attention. I keep quiet when it happens, when you take his hand and disappear out the door or into an alley. I keep quiet when you come back, whenever I see you handling money, but it still stings.

God, does it sting.

My sword could level a city. I hold it in my hands, and my blood pumps. I grin and lick my teeth. This guy's big. It looks promising, and he's only a little drunk. I get my ass handed to me pretty bad, mostly because of his sheer size and weight. It goes on for almost ten minutes, and ends with me ducking a swipe by bending my spine back impossibly far and then rebounding to cut his belly open. I had a speed advantage and it had only taken that one second to end it. The ground shakes when his knees go down, then he teeters and crashes forward.

That had been fun. I stand there and heave with laughter and exhaustion for a moment, before my heart starts slowing down and my brain catches up on my injuries. The pain blasts through me all at once and damn, I really got fucked up, didn't I?

You take care of me the next day when my wounds are infected and aching like crazy. I swear no one can cook rice like you do. It's so fucking fluffy and light, but it still sticks together. You're such a comfort to me when I've got nothing else.

I'm so stiff the next day that I can't move my leg. It takes you a couple hours to get hot water, but you do get it and it helps a lot on my joints and soothes the cut and the yellow shit that's coming out of it. Geez, that can't be good. I have to bite something when you tell me you've gotta' get rid of that, and you take my sword and cut off the scab and squeeze the wound to get all that bad crap out, washing it well and then wrapping it really good this time.

"God damn," I pant as I finally flop back when you're done. Fuck, that had hurt so bad, but that fight was still worth it. I grin tiredly when you move next to me and place your hand between the shoulder-blades and pat me. It vaguely registers in the aware-part of my brain that you're actually touching me. I'm still shuddering in pain and my leg feels like it's on fire. I feel woozy. You scratch my neck a couple times comfortingly and move in to peck the back of my head and tell me you're glad that I fight so well, and I'm sure I flush as red as a fucking tomato. "Aw, fuck off," I mumble, but I'm probably smiling like a fool. You just laugh once in response.

Even if I'm fucked up for a month after a bad fight, I'm proud of the win, because you never say 'this is too dangerous. You have to stop doing this to yourself.' No, you're happy for my victory too, no matter how much I pay for it. What doesn't kill me makes me stronger, and I'm glad you know that too.

I find myself with less respect for the weak. If they tried harder, they'd be like me. I know I have to build more discipline still, but I know that I'm better than them now. I can't help from smiling when I fight, because I know that I'm going to win.

I don't respect the weak, but I still have respect for you. Even though I know you won't fight your circumstances hard enough to break free, I still respect that it's your decision. You resolved yourself to something horrible and stuck by it, and that took grit, even if it was misplaced grit. You're not who I thought you were, but you still have a place in my heart. You're not weak, you're anything but weak to bear through that kind of shit. You're tough.

One day I wake up and I'm taller than you. I just am, and I don't remember being that way yesterday, but I definitely am. I feel uncomfortable and weird in my stomach, because I know that I'm going to keep growing. I've known for a long time that I'm going to get bigger than you, and I don't know how I feel about it. I don't want to think that you're weaker or smaller, because I don't have respect for the weak.

No, you're not weaker, I'm just stronger. There's a difference, at least to me there is.

This time the fight is brutal and is over quickly. I got a dagger stuck between my ribs and he ends up with a broken neck and a big cut in his stomach. I see a liver in there, which is amazing considering how much he obviously drank.

You pull the knife out of me later, quick and efficient, and the stab wound is deep. You clean that and tell me I need a stitch or two, so as I ball up a scrap of cloth and hold the cut, I walk with you into town and we knock on doors, looking for someone who will lend a needle and thread.

You let the needle sit in alcohol for about ten minutes and then sew me together. The part that hurt especially bad wasn't the piercing of the needle, but the thread being dragged through my flesh when you pulled the stitches tight. That gets infected overnight, inflamed, red, and angry, and I can hardly lift my arm because it tugs on the wound. We keep pouring alcohol on it every few hours, and my side is always sticky. This one takes less time to heal. Maybe a little under a month, but it heals well. It drove me nuts to have to rest for that long, but that's what I get for letting myself get knifed. I'm ready to fight again, and this time I won't let that happen.

I wonder what it's like to have sex with a woman. I think about that a lot now. I mean, what do they look like? I know what breasts look like, and I know what's down there too, but I haven't seen it close enough to really tell for sure or have a clear picture. I'm imagining a plain line, just a slit right there, but that can't be all there is to it, right? I know how sex works, of course - the guy goes inside - but I don't know what the woman actually looks like there. I'd like to see one day, maybe. I wonder what it's like to have sex with a woman, I wonder how it feels.

From what I've gathered, there are two kinds of girls out here – ones who resist without fail, and ones who agree without fail.

They call you the same thing that they call those girls who always agree.

I wonder if sex makes people hateful, if they stop thinking it's this special thing. That's probably why these guys hit and curse at the same women who warm their beds at night. It's probably not special at all. Maybe I'm playing it up too much, because I wonder a lot how it's like. I wonder what a woman looks like naked, that mysterious v-shape that comes down from both hips and between their legs that seems to be nothing from a distance. It looks flat, like nothing's there. I wonder how they pee. It's a strange thought, I know that, but it drives me nuts to wonder.

I wonder how it's like to see one naked, how it's like to lay down with a woman. How is it like to touch her breast, how is it to put it inside? I wonder, but I don't particularly want to do it. I wonder, I keep wondering and it consumes my thoughts. What is it about this thing of theirs that turns boys into bad men, men who drool and slobber and jeer, men who will kiss their mothers but go out and treat other women so badly? What turns these guys into animals, what makes them so hungry at night that they can't function without a girl in their arms? It's probably not this thing that a girl has at all, but the guys being bad inside all on their own.

I'm probably old enough to make a child, aren't I? It's weird to think of, but I guess I'm old enough to make a baby. I could have sex, probably, if I wanted, but I don't think I'm missing much. No, I'm not missing out on a damn thing, not when I think of how bereft you always are, you always are, when you come back after a roll in the hay. You come back from having gone to bed with someone, and your eyes are dead.

I wonder if any of my friends have lain down with you.

You've taken me to brothels by now, my fair share of bars, and you tell me to have my fun, but that if I make a girl pregnant, I must take responsibility and consequently my fighting days will be over. I take that to heart like you wouldn't believe.

My friends keep encouraging me, and I listen on to their stories, but my interest isn't piqued. Maybe you want to tease me about it, or maybe you think I'm just too shy to ask a girl to come to bed with me, so you extend advice. It's absolutely mortifying to hear you tell me how to pleasure a partner, and I always shout at the top of my lungs and plug my ears like I'm eight. I say that sounds horrible and that I don't want it. You smile and tell me that I won't always feel that way, that I'm growing up and that I'll feel differently soon. The thing is, I already feel grown up. I feel like I already have grown up, and I don't want this thing that they talk about. Don't you see that? I'm already an adult and I still don't want it, and I don't know if I ever will 'grow up' and suddenly want it.

I'm close enough to being a man that I might as well be one, and I still don't feel that thing. I don't feel this thing that they talk about. When they look at girls when they're hanging out with me, I feel like they see some other creature than I'm seeing. I just see a young woman, but they see ultraviolet arrows or something, like bees and flowers. Maybe. I don't know why they drool like that. I don't see the appeal of slobbering on someone else's face, of touching tongues or biting someone's ear or putting hands inside their underwear. I don't think it's gross or weird, I just don't feel the impulse or motivation to do something like that. I just wanna' drink and play cards. Some of my friends stay, some of them go on their woman-hunt like men possessed.

I don't want to look for others. If I had a thousand friends, I wouldn't be able to be close to any. I'd rather just have one. I don't want to look for others. I don't want you to look for others. I want to be with you, and I want you to be with me, like when I was younger.

My friends say it's important that I lose my virginity, and it gets so annoying that I think about lying to them just to get them off my case. They say it's a test of my manliness, to see if I could get a woman, that a male virgin has failed in life, that I can't die a virgin or else what was my life for? That's such a pile, and I tell them so.

You said there's no whores, no prudes, and there can be no virgins either. There's no such thing and I see that now. How on earth does a dick know whether it's cumming because of a hand or a woman's body around it? It doesn't. Same with girls, how does their body know the difference between fingers and a man's body inside? How would the skin know if anything had been inside at all or if it was just the opposite wall touching against it? The body doesn't know. There's no such thing as virginity, no biological basis for it. It's something that was made up by people to distinguish pure and dirty, to make people feel guilty, just like you said. It's just another way of people trying to control others with words, and I feel like I might be one of those people you were talking about when you first taught me about sex.

There's people who do what they want in bed, people who resist and keep their desires secret, and people who just don't care, who just don't feel it. I think that's me. What I care about is good beer and good fights. Maybe cool coin tricks. Nice fireworks in the distance. Flower-smells. Pork-ribs.

I want to grow up all the way, officially, so I can prove to you that I'm not gonna' change, that I won't ever turn into that kind of man, that not all men have to be bad men. I won't be one of them. On my honor, I won't be one of those men who's skirt-chasin' after you. I have to hurry and become a man, so I can show you that you can still look in my eyes and see someone you once knew. I won't become like them.

I take up drinking. I've only gotten wrecked once or twice, because I really learned my lesson when I was puking up my guts while I was out with my buddies. No one wants to be that guy, but it was all of us at least once. I learn to hold my liquor, and the most important thing I learn is when to say, 'no, that was the last shot. I'm done.' See, I don't wanna' be unable to fight if we're at the bar, so there's a fine line of how much I can knock back before it starts really going to my blood and my brain. There's all sorts of thugs that hang out at the bar, and I don't wanna' miss my chance because I'm too wasted. I don't wanna' miss my chance.

'Come on', they say, because there's a gangbang going on and this could be my chance to get laid. They tell me to just come on, it'll be quick, and I'll like it.

"Nah, I'm busy", I say. I'm playing poker with a stranger, and I'm trying to count those damn cards. When I beat him and he gets mad, thinking I cheated, I wanna' be ready to fight. I'm not wasting time with my clothes around my feet. "I'll see you guys later, okay?" I say, and they shrug. I hear 'he'll never change', and I grin a little. Damn straight.

Nah, I'm not interested in that shit. I see that sex isn't special. It's not something really great that you do with someone you love, and if it's not, then I don't care for it. It's not for love, ever, at least not out here. I'm a one on one guy, and I wouldn't be happy to do it with someone one time and then never see them again or have to share them. Screw that. No, sex isn't special, it's something that feeds, but leaves the recipient hungrier every time. It's something that calms, but leaves the user restless. It's something that sedates and leaves the participants frenetic. It's something that drains, it takes away; it's unfulfilling and addictive. It makes them think they're getting something, that they've gained something every time they get a new girl in their arms, but they lose more and more, they need, and no one should ever need like that. They're left desperate every night. High-risk loveless sex drains the spirit over time.

You are proof of that.

I've gotta' get stronger. I'm not good enough yet. I'm nowhere near as strong as I wanna' be yet. I've gotta' keep getting better. I've improved so much, but I've gotta' keep getting better.

This fight is hot and heavy. I'm working hand over fist for every moment of breath. I'm bleeding all over and I think I might actually die for a minute, but I know I won't die before I beat him. I'm gonna' win, on my honor. When am I going to get enough of this?

God, I don't want enough. I don't want to stop, not ever. I want to be strong enough to slay this awful world.

I fall to one knee, my foot having slipped in a pool of his friend's blood. There had been about ten, but now there's three. Big, ugly, and stupid. Big guy's got a ring on his hand, learned that the hard way when my cheek split from a punch. Ugly's fast, but hesitates too much, and his guts are coming out. Stupid's a lost cause, but he keeps getting up.

I messed up my back from that last hit, and I'm getting fucked up pretty bad. God, I feel alive. This is what I live for, this feeling of weightlessness, elation, living only because of my own capability. I could slip up and be killed, but I won't, because I have that power.

You're off to the side watching, aren't you, somewhere on the edge of the carnage and the field of bodies and the blood soaking the street. You're back there watching, so I can't lose. I won't lose. I've seen at least one of these guys with you before, and it made killing them that much sweeter.

Ugly's lost too much blood now, and the big guy finally gets me and I hear my shoulder pop and my arm drops uselessly - it's not moving. That's not good.

You scream for me back there, and I can't take it right now. Shut up and let me focus. I don't want you to worry about me. It's the first time you've ever done that out loud, that you've ever doubted that I would win. I didn't want you to show fear, because when you do, there's reason to be afraid, and I don't wanna' know that. Keep that inside, Yumichika. I don't want you to break.

"I don't want your help."

Don't worry about me, don't fear for my life. That's an insult, that stings so much when I've come this far. Don't you think I can beat them, Yumichika? You don't have to come to my rescue anymore, and I won't let you. I'll become strong and I won't let you help anymore. Don't interfere. Don't you dare interfere ever again. You'd better respect that. If I can watch you walk off in the arms of a sicko, you can watch me do this. If you can't stop yourself, if you really can't keep quiet, why don't you just go away for a while? Just go.

We don't talk for a week.

There's wild dogs running around the town, and I see one of them with a hand in its mouth. There's some boys that can't be more than thirteen who are fastening their belts and running past me. I'm wandering the woods on my own now, kicking a dog that snapped at me a little too close to get out of my fucking face. They're around my legs and they're fighting over something in the difference. I don't have to get close to know what it is, and I move on. I hop a stream and come to the edge of the wilderness.

It's barren desert as far as I can see, so I turn back and keep going through the sparse trees until I find a few patches of grass. Something smells rancid, and I hear low buzzing noises. I come around a bend and there's a dead girl on the ground, and she's naked and on her back, legs spread open. Who knows how many times her killers came back for her body, but she was starting to seriously rot now. There's cum on the ground, I can smell it; someone's been coming here to whack off. She had been pretty in life, but maggots are eating away at one eyesocket, and they're coming out of that place that I never got to see up close before.

I stop dead and stare. I blink and I try to look away, but the image is burning itself into my eyeballs and I can't stop turning back around to take another look. It reminds me of that dream I had a few years ago. I keep trying to walk away, but I can't stop turning back to look at her again and soon it's absolutely branded in my brain.

I throw up. I stumble away and I throw up again.

She'd been a prostitute, surely. I'd seen the white paint on the high spots of her face, meant to catch the glow of the moon at night and make her appear more lovely. She'd probably been out working and some men had taken her away and killed her. I think of you like that, lying dead in the woods, your corpse still a warm place for people to come back and stick it in until you're too rotten to be enjoyed. I think of you like this girl. It could happen one day. As long as you keep doing this, that possibility will always be there.

'It's my decision,' you said.

I think of that endlessly. When I try to sleep, her body is there, even if I keep my eyes open. How easily it could be you. End up with the wrong guy and you turn up dead. End up with the wrong guy and they're raping you and they won't pay, and it was all for nothing. End up with the wrong guy and they take you away and kill you. You won't be buried, never, you'll just lay there and they'll keep coming back to look at you and jerk off. When I close my eyes and try to rest, her body is there in my mind. I think of it still, even though it's your decision to put yourself at that risk, in that danger. It's your decision to do those things.

My sword is crossed with another blade and there's blood in my eyes. This is my decision, Yumichika. Fighting.

I will fight for myself, and I will fight alone. I don't want to fight with you or against you anymore. This is my decision. You taught me that resolve.

I don't touch you anymore. Touching isn't special to you like it was with my mom. No, it doesn't mean anything to you if you can do it with strangers, so I stopped a while ago. I feel like it hurts you almost, saps your energy. You'll look so tired and grey, dark circles on your face when you come back from a long night alone, and I'll be careful not to touch you in bed at all, because you look like you feel awful. You sleep with other people, and you come back looking like you've aged a thousand years. I won't add to your burden.

I fucking hate those shinigami bastards. I've got reiatsu – I learned that's what it's called – but I'll never fucking go to Seireitei and be one of them. I hate them so damn much, but I won't fight them. I'd die too easy, even I know that, and you didn't raise me to die an easy meaningless death.

I can feel my power growing. My reiatsu concentration has increased and it's getting really thick. It gets better every time I meditate. I feel powerful. I'm nineteen, and I'm so close to being a man. Just a few more months.

You and I still walk side by side, but you don't look me in the eye. I have to prompt you more often into speaking. Have I hurt you? What's your problem? Maybe you've finally gotten tired of my attitude, but there's not much I can do about it. This is who I am, and I'm not gonna' change. I've got my dream, and I'm gonna' reach it.

I know you're much older than me than you'd initially seemed. Maybe even a hundred years older. I guess it doesn't matter, but however much it is, it puts a big gap between us, and that makes it seem not so big at all, if that makes sense. Almost like there was only so far away you could be from me in age, which was why you've always treated me like a man. Maybe that's why I've always felt like one with you.

Maybe it would've been different if you'd known me when I was five or so, if you'd seen me really young, but at the time we'd met, you never really treated me like a kid. You indulged me sure, but you never did make me feel like your little brother.

Well I'm all grown up. I'm a man now. I feel like a man, even though I'm still not yet twenty. I really grew up, didn't I, under your care and guidance. You weren't the best guardian, since you didn't do any guarding or real comforting, but I learned so damn much from you.

I learned that anything worth having, I've gotta' get and do myself, and if I don't do it right the first time, I've gotta' try again and hope for better. I learned that I have to expect the best from myself and not accept anything else in order to improve. I learned what unrealistic expectations were. I became a man around you, through those years, a little at a time.

You're the reason I figured out how to make the right kind of friends, because I learned how to stand up to people's shit and actually believe it when I thought I deserved better than to be treated like a freak.

Most of all, I learned from you that damn near nothing is free, not even loving.

I get it, why you treat me differently from yourself. You didn't want me to grow up and become like you. You wanted me to stand tall when I became a man. You wanted me to look ahead, not at my feet. You wanted me to be certain of myself. Well, I will be.

You have sex because you're afraid to die, well, I'm not. You look for love because you're afraid to be alone, well, I'm not. You let people call you those things, because you believe them, well, I fucking don't.

You raised me to be confident, to not need you. I grew up independent. You raised me to fix my own problems, and I grew up analytical. You raised me to have control and determination, a handle on myself, and I fucking will. I promise I won't ask you for help. I don't know the answers, but I don't ask anymore. I won't, no matter what. I'll figure it out on my own.

I won't be like you. I won't make your efforts go to waste. I'll be who you raised me to be. I promise. I will get stronger, so strong that you won't recognize me.

I won't do this for your approval; I'll do it for me. That's what you wanted all along, was for me to be the best I could, and I will. I'll fight and think only of the enjoyment, only of winning and being stronger each time, and afterwards, you always tell me how I did, if I did better than the last. It feels good to see the bittersweet pride in your eyes.

No, I won't be like you. I'm not gonna' look back like you did. I'm heading forward and I won't falter. That's who I am, because of you. That's who you built with the first brick, and I'm never gonna' stop building this house. This is where I'll live for the rest of my life, and the walls are gonna' be strong. I won't be like you. I won't be like you, I won't let you down, I promise.

I raise my sword and I grin. I'm not afraid to die.