Kai Hiwatari - Years of Turbulence (IV)

Part Four: Late Teens (iii)

Their families spoke Russian in their homes when they didn't have guests to remember the roots and to honour their ancestors but the boys kept up this habit even when outside, using the language to communicate with each other, sometimes loudly and obnoxiously in hallways and cafeterias and dorm rooms making other students distance themselves from them. They did it because the language brought them comfort, and also because they wanted to set themselves apart from their peers, maintaining an air of mystery around them... and also because they had a truckload of secrets.

The use of the foreign tongue had its ups and downs. While the habit certainly got them noticed (way before they started the afterschool fight club) and made them popular among the girls and gave them privacy, it also made sure that they'd always be seen as some sort of outsiders. Some of the boys were outgoing and made other friends but these friends could never get close enough to any of them to be considered as a 'best friend'.

So the group was in some fashion isolated from the rest of their peers. This was never a problem for Kai who liked being by himself, or for Tala, even though he was one of the more outgoing ones, or Bryan or Ian, but Sergei had issues. He was the only one among them who believed in love and had a serious girlfriend. Said girlfriend was already jealous of the other boys for taking up too much of his time and making him keep secrets from her, so the language thing really didn't help his situation.

Gina was griping about it to Sergei in the library one day while Kai was within earshot.

"Is it really bros before hoes with you?"

"Bros befo- I don't think you're a h-h-h-"

"No, I know you don't think that, but you understand what I'm saying, right?"

Kai sneaked a look at Sergei and saw him scratching his arm cluelessly. "Um"

He had to hide a smile.

"He's pussy-whipped," Ian whispered to him, his Physics notebook spread before him on the table he was sharing with Kai.

"Are they always going to come first?" Gina was a nice girl. Kai liked her well enough. He wondered where Yuriy was. Yuriy couldn't tolerate a minute of this. "Because if they do, you'll end up alone. No one wants to be made to feel like they're your second choice all the time, you know?"

"Don't worry, darling," Tala's voice reached Kai as he returned with the book he'd gone searching for and slung an arm across Sergei's shoulders, careening forward to sneer at Gina. "We'll take good care of him."

The girl's expression shuttered at his arrival, exasperated. She threw one loaded look at Sergei before retreating to another table a couple of aisles down, not wanting to engage with Tala and his bullshit.

Kai checked out of their conversation soon after and focused back on his Physics homework. He got interrupted less than two minutes later by one very curious Ian.

"Kai? What's the strongest acid in the world?"

"Hydrochloric or Muriatic out of the common ones," he replied without taking his eyes off his textbook.

"Where could I find it?"

"There's some in the Chem lab." Kai looked up from his work to regard Ian. He looked tense, but Ian always looked tense. "Why?" he asked.

"I'd like to carry some with me. For my own protection." He seemed defensive at first, then considered him quietly for a minute before suddenly surging forward, dropping his voice and latching onto Kai's sleeve. "They're not going to leave us alone, Kai. I know they said they would but they're lying. They always lie."

"I know" said Kai, pushing his hand away. "But acids aren't the best weapons. You could burn yourself."

"I'm not you. I'm not six feet tall. I need a way to protect myself."

"You don't need acid for that, Ian. My grandfather's estate has an armoury, and Bryan's uncle makes arms," he reminded him.

"We're not allowed in any of those places!"

Kai turned back to his textbook. "You don't have to worry about that."

"Why?" he asked, then gasped before asking in a shocked whisper, "Are we going to break in?"

Kai flipped a page.

"Are we?" He tugged at his sleeve insistently.

"Yes. And no."


February 4th, the day they planned to rob Bryan's uncle, Maxim Kuznetsov, was the day Kai learned what his biggest fear was.

"You said we were all going together!" Ian exploded inside the car that was parked a block away from one of the closest warehouses of the Kuznetsovs' weapons manufacturing company.

"No," Kai replied, tying a plain black mask around his face. "I said it was going to be just me and Yuriy."

"Let the women stay behind," Bryan pushed Ian out of the way so he could lean forward between the seats. "I'm coming with you."

"No"

"It's my uncle's warehouse, you fuckers!"

"It's simple math," Tala shrugged on his backpack, dressed head to toe in black similar to Kai. "Five idiots will attract more attention than two idiots, hence you three will stay in the car."

"What if you need help?" asked Ian, panicking. "More manpower?"

"We're going to steal guns, not tanks," Kai rolled his eyes.

"Five people couldn't steal a tank," said Sergei from the driver's seat.

"Sergei" said Tala. "Shut up"

"Tala, move your ass," said Kai, opening the door. "It's 01:55." Then he turned to Sergei. "Remember, if you're spotted, drive off. Don't wait for us."

"Fuck me" Tala cursed, drawing a cross over himself. "See you in fifteen, boys."

"Try not to die," Sergei called after them as the other two in the car grumbled.

The events that left Kai shaken that night did not take place at the warehouse. He'd planned the heist well. It was during their retreat from the facility with two medium-sized backpacks' worth of firearms that the first sign of a not-so-smooth operation appeared.

They were spotted. With the amount of guards and security stationed all around the building it was a given. Kai had prepared for it, choosing Tala to go with him instead of Sergei or Bryan. Ian was never an option because he panicked too quickly, all thanks to Boris. Tala was fast and slim compared to the others, good for blending in with the shadows and fleeing at a moment's notice.

Maxim would definitely find out about the robbery, but he could never trace it back to the boys. Kai had put off stealing from his own grandfather's weapons collection till spring that year to avoid suspicion. They wore masks and gloves and made sure to turn the cameras' faces away. There were much bigger and likelier candidates than them.

The car was gone when they managed to sneak out of the facility.

"Fuck" Tala swore at his side, panting. "They were probably seen."

"It's ok. We taped the number plate." Kai saw flashlights and shouts heading their way. "Run"

They climbed over the fencing around the perimeter and dropped into a shabby side of the town. The guards followed. Yuriy and Kai split up, deciding it best to take different routes and then meet up at the location they'd agreed upon earlier once they managed to lose their tails.

What Kai didn't foresee when he began dodging shit in the alleyways was that they would probably run into shady people. Most of the buildings in the area were rundown and dilapidated. Trash overflowing dumpsters and on the ground, a damp smell of rot permeating the air, windows boarded, no porch light in sight, yet Kai paid little attention to all of these when he was taking turn after turn to lose the men at his heels.

He was behind a particularly nasty garbage bin, nostrils pinched against the smell, when the frantically following footsteps finally halted and retreated.

He waited a few minutes before navigating around the old buildings towards their marked location on the GPS. When he reached the road, Yuriy was not there.

He checked the time and chose to wait a few more minutes before searching for Yuriy's location on his phone.

Five minutes later, he was still about twenty meters away.

Kai went looking for him.

Yuriy's location was live but idle. He was standing still at the same spot. Kai pulled out two revolvers Tala had loaded earlier while he was playing with them in the warehouse and left his backpack in a small nook he deemed safe enough before making his way towards the sounds coming from a few buildings over. Sounds of men talking and jeering and shuffling.

He was taking careful steps, trying to be discreet, planning to catch them off guard if Tala was in trouble, when he heard the noise. A small, fleeting sound he would have missed if he hadn't been catching his breath in that moment. A moan.

A soft, broken moan of pain.

Kai abandoned discretion and ran towards it then. If he hadn't run he wouldn't have made it on time. He feared to think what would have happened if he hadn't chosen to sprint at that very moment.

The scene that greeted him in the alley - a full moon in the sky, bottles on the ground, and five men between two closely situated houses, four on their feet, one on the ground - incapacitated and about to have his leg removed.

The revolvers were up in the air and firing before the terror had time to fully form. He cut the thought nearly at its inception.

What he remembered feeling was blind outrage in that instant. Outrage at what they were attempting to do.

How dare they?

The men dropped away from Yuriy like cut trees, limp and dead.

When he reached his side he waited to make sure the men were all gone - putting two more bullets in the one who had been handling the saw - before asking Tala if he was alright. The sharp blade gleamed menacingly and it made Kai want to hurt things. The red in his vision only cleared when his eyes fell upon Yuriy - still halfway sitting on the ground, hands on bruising asphalt, his left pant leg pushed up to his knee - unblemished white skin wrapping around a strong, protruding shin. He looked stunned. The skin on his face extra pale as he stared at the bodies strewn around him, then he blinked and licked his lips, returning to himself. "Yeah"

Kai stuck the guns into his belt. "We have to leave."

Tala rose to his feet without help and found his backpack near one of the men passed out at the side of a house - droplets of blood stained the material but he mentioned nothing of it to Kai. A hush fell upon them then, upon and around, and it didn't break till the sun was well over the horizon the next day.


They spent the night at a hotel. Yuriy taking the couch, leaving the bed free for Kai who lay in it stiffly for all of an hour before getting up and pacing around restlessly till dawn.

Kai was a good friend, and an even better brother, and the boys constantly put their necks on the line for each other. Tala himself didn't have any reason to support Kai in his endeavours other than dumb love. It was something they did. It never occurred to any of them to not help one another when they were in a situation. Bryan wanted to buy a new car? Pitch in money. Ian liked a girl? Help him score. Sergei wanted to make it to the football team? Train with him. Kai wanted to build an empire of his own? Stand by his side.

Tala was pretty sure he would take a bullet for Kai if necessary. But put a bullet in someone else? That was a whole different story.

He'd never killed anyone. He'd trained for it. He was the best marksman out of all of them. But he'd never even hurt a cat. He liked to think about it - hurting people - for his own enjoyment. But he'd never actually caused irreparable damage to anyone.

He didn't know what it was like to take someone's life. Whether he would react to it in the same way Kai did. Tala was aware he had a crueler mind than Kai. Certainly not as brave a heart, but definitely a crueler one.

He didn't think he would punish himself over hurting someone like Kai. But it must be difficult, to live with the knowledge that someone's life ended because of you.

That incident changed Kai. Messed him up real good inside. In some ways he never came back from it. The little peace he'd had for a few months gone in the blink of an eye because Tala couldn't keep his mouth shut.

Because a bunch of Yakuza losers thought they could rule the world by beating people up and removing limbs.

In the end, Kai was paying the price for all of it. His deeds, his responsibility. Yuriy could think that, but he had done it for him.

It was his responsibility too.

Kai came to sit beside him when dawn broke. When the world was dull and grey and quiet. Tala had taken his hand, held it to his own chest and hoped that was enough of a comfort to him.

Tala loved Kai. He couldn't think of anyone or anything in the world he cared more about and so what he felt for Kai must have been love. For one, he felt at peace when he was near. The closer the better.

What it wasn't was a dick thing. A gay thing. He'd assumed it was. Not sure about the nature of the feelings he harboured for Kai in his chest. Yet one night of intimacy with him and he knew, it wasn't about his dick.

Kissing him didn't feel like kissing a girl. It felt different. Better even in some ways. The urge to reach into his pants, however, was absent. He wanted, rather, simply, to just keep him close. Make him stay.

As bewildering and deranged as that was, Kai had killed four people for him. Without blinking or hesitating. Shot ten times and met his mark each time when he wasn't even the best shot. If that wasn't love, what was it?


Kai shut himself away after that incident, opting to feel nothing when he was sure if he lingered upon it he would let himself go.

Choosing to numb his feelings with alcohol and depressants seemed like the perfect way to deal with it till Julia stumbled into class two days after the incident - wan and lost - and threw away an important exam. She'd sat in the hall for all of ten minutes before handing in the paper and walking out with a pale face.

Kai discovered she'd skipped the rest of the classes that afternoon and gone to her suite, instead of the dorm, because she had been feeling ill. When he knocked on the door to her suite in the Four Seasons at seven in the evening she answered in a silken bathrobe, with blonde wet hair and a flute of liquor in her hand.

Her eyes appeared sharp and sober despite the drink as she appraised him at her threshold, a small smirk pulling on her bare lips. She let him in wordlessly.

Julia lowered into a chair and tucked her feet up on the cushion beside her as she offered him a seat opposite her. "Tell me," she said, "what brings an over-occupied person like yourself into my home?"

"You walked out of an exam." Kai left his glass of drink untouched.

She waved an exaggeratedly dismissive hand.

"An important one."

"I was joking. I have no interest in stealing your thunder."

"What about your own education? You seemed to have a lot of interest in a lot of subjects less than a couple weeks ago."

Julia stared into her Pinot Grigio instead of meeting his eyes. Her face was scrubbed clean of all make up. Her features looking vulnerable without it. Her mouth pulled down at the corners frailly like she might cry at any moment, but was holding back with everything she had. And if Kai saw himself in her right then he didn't mention it.

"No," she said, her voice strong and unbothered like she didn't care about what she was saying. "Not really. Most of the time I'm confused about what I really feel. Whether I really like something or if it's just the Molly in my veins. It's like I have a faulty connection with myself."

Like you don't know who you are anymore?

The words rang in his head like an omen and he dropped his gaze to his shoes. To the floor between his feet. The threads of gold winding across the marble. "So you never cared?"

"I did care. Once. Before all the shit happened. Now I'm chasing my own shadow. Trying to be who I was when I'm not that person anymore. It's tiring. It's like I'm on a wild goose chase."

Their faint reflections were on the wide window they were sitting next to, looking more melancholy than each of them let on. "What happened?" he asked, his voice empty, his hands empty. He'd placed the drink on the end table beside him.

He needed to whether this storm on steady feet. Or he'd forget how to walk without a crutch once it passed.

Julia took a small fragile sip of her white wine, absently examining the patterns on the floor. She told him the story of how she was sent away from her country for a crime that was committed against her.

It had been at a college party she was invited to by her older friends. Her friends had all gotten too drunk to take care of her when she got a bit too comfortable with some of the guys she knew at the party. When Julia told people what had happened to her that night, nobody believed her. She went to the police and filed a report. The guys who had raped her had influential families and they ostracized her and her parents for having spread a bad name about their sons in their society. They claimed she had ruined their sons' futures. Unable to continue going out in public anymore because of all the vicious rumours circulating about her and her family, the Fernandezes sent her not to a different school in the country, but to a different country altogether.

Kai heard what she was saying loud and clear. Julia had been silenced. Just like him. May be it was because of the similarity in their stories that Kai decided that she would always have a listener in him. "I believe you," he said, meeting her green eyes.

Julia smiled.

"I'm sorry for what happened with Yuriy."

"Yuriy?"

"Tala" he corrected when she seemed confused.

She gave a small laugh when she understood what and whom he was talking about. "All water under the bridge. It's not his fault. I have bad weeks every now and then."

"I'll have him come and apologize to you anyway." Because it was clear he had triggered bad memories when he cupped a hand over Julia's mouth.

She told him not to do that. "Don't. That's not necessary. But you should talk to him. I'm sure he has some…things to say to you."

Kai nodded, told her he would. "Will you take a retest?" he asked out of curiosity.

"Why?" Julia asked. "Are you bored already? Starving for competition, Hiwatari?"

He picked up his glass and held it up in a toast to her instead of answering. He wanted Julia to be herself though he barely knew her. He wanted her to beat the addiction, get over her past, because it would suck to lose the most interesting person he'd ever met before he got a chance to know her.

Unbeknownst to him, Kai had saved Julia's life that night. By choosing to knock on her door and talk to her, listen to her, and remind her that there was always going to be someone who would stand by her, he'd stopped her from swallowing the entire bag of pills she'd lain out for herself on her pillow.

Talking to her in turn helped remind Kai of the dangers of the path he was heading down. He couldn't trust himself to always be careful with the amount of depressants he consumed. He decided to seek out other methods of release then, staying away from drugs for the rest of his time in high school.


Talk to him. I'm sure he has some things to say to you.

"They were Yakuza. Direct runners of the upper fucking echelons." Smoke escaped from his nose and mouth when he spoke. Kai sat on the hardwood floor with his legs stretched out in front of him, facing Yuriy who was leaning on the opposite wall, mirroring him. A clear glass wall protecting them from meeting the streets of Shinjuku city twenty floors below if they were to lean sideways.

"How do you know?"

"I saw their tattoos. Caught a peek when one of their shirts accidentally rode up during the fight. Not an inch was left blank."

"The designs matched?"

"Yep. Full body."

Great. "They were probably doing runs in the neighbourhood. I saw one of them passed out on the side of the building."

"He was definitely on something. But I don't think there were any cameras around. There's a slim chance of them finding out who did it."

Kai wasn't optimistic. "They have the bullets I put in their men. They'll know about the robbery too. Once they trace the bullets to the guns we stole from the warehouse, they'll know the same people were involved in both. Maxim and the Yakuza will have a common enemy to hunt down and they'll team up. We won't be able to go back."

"Why do you want to go back?" Tala asked, perplexed.

"The ammo we stole won't last for long," said Kai. "We can't hit my grandfather's armory either because he'd figure it out right away. He'd know it was me and put a stop to everything."

And then it would all be over before it even began. He couldn't let that happen.

"We have about a hundred rounds. What do we need so many for?" asked Yuriy. "Those guns are a safety measure. We're not a fucking gang."

"They see us as one."

Tala frowned, regarding him suspiciously. "You've got to be kidding me. What are you planning?"

Kai shook his head, and looked out the window, evading his question. "I talked to Julia yesterday."

"Quit changing the subject."

"I" Kai repeated with more emphasis, "talked to Julia yesterday."

Tala exhaled with frustration, then he grunted distastefully. "Why?"

"She looked like she needed a friend."

He may have been slightly put off by Kai's avoidance but the last statement out of his mouth drew a chuckle out of Tala. He got up from the floor and walked the little distance to Kai so he could sit beside him. "Suddenly, you care about other people?"

"Suddenly?"

Yuriy slung an arm around his neck and tugged him closer. "You want to bang her?" he leered light-heartedly.

"My mother wants me to marry her," said Kai.

His smile fell fast.

Kai turned his head to look at him. He could see his pores from this proximity. "Don't worry," he whispered. "I don't want to bang her."

Talk to him. I'm sure he has some things to say to you.

Tala was staring unfocused out the window, mouth slightly hanging open. Then he shut it with a click of his teeth and met Kai's gaze, something hidden in his eyes. "Speaking of banging, I lied about forgetting that night," he said. "I was barely drunk."

Kai knew which night he was talking about without him having to mention it. "Why'd you lie about it?" he asked.

"Why did you?" he shot back. He hadn't believed him even for a second.

He shook his head minutely. He hadn't want to talk about it that morning because it hadn't felt appropriate at that moment. At that time. With a headache hammering in his skull and sunlight burning his eyes. And then days had passed and they'd pushed it to the backs of their minds. Till now. In a cosy nook of the swanky but private Petrov suite while Petrov himself was absent, and the other boys were lost in some other parts of the apartment. Up to their own thing. It felt like they were back in their old dorms, sharing a bed, and having a secret conversation. "It was fun, wasn't it?" Kai asked after a minute in a softer tone, a smirk twisting his lips slightly.

A slow smile spread across Yuriy's features. "Of all kinds," he replied. "We should do it again sometime."

He didn't say anything to that, let his eyes speak for him instead. The tension broke regardless.

Yuriy pulled him down to the floor till they were lying on the ground side by side, gazing at the gibbous moon hanging in the cloudless sky. "I used to think you were gay," he suddenly said out of nowhere.

"Me? Why?" he asked instead of admitting he thought the same about Tala for a few weeks.

"You never wanted to fuck any girls."

A snicker tumbled out of Kai.

"Can you blame me? You always had your head buried in a book - not that you're any better now. The only naked bodies you got to see were in the gym showers."

"I barely use those showers," Kai butted in.

"Kind of homo. If you'd never met Amhya you'd have stayed a virgin for life."

"That's not true. Amhya wasn't a catalyst. She was my first but I'd sought her out. It wasn't the other way around."

"Who was it then?" asked Tala.

"Julia" said Kai.

"Fuck?" Tala propped himself onto an elbow to stare at him incredulously. "You said you didn't want to bang her. I didn't know it was because you already had her."

Kai was surprised by his sudden outburst. "I haven't, Yuriy. She was my first kiss, that's all. I don't get it. What's your problem with her?"

The question gave Tala pause. He shrugged, the anger melting off of him. "Nothing," he said, carefully schooling his expression. "I just don't like her."

Kai said nothing, waiting for him to replay his own words in his head and elaborate once he realized how unfinished and ambiguous his previous statement was.

He clucked a tongue uncomfortably. "Girl has a stick up her butt," he slowly started to explain. "I told her to stay the fuck away from you and she looked me in the eye and said 'no'."

Kai narrowed his eyes. "That's it? You're pissed because she has a spine?"

"And…" he continued, cutting Kai off, working his jaw like he had a bitter taste in his mouth. "She thinks I have a thing for you."

Kai took a long minute filled with silence to process that. "That's what the hallway fight was about," he said in a careful monotonous tone.

Tala sighed then laid back down still speaking. "I was going through an identity crisis. That bitch had no business making things that difficult for me."

Kai stared blindly at the ceiling before letting out an amused exhale. "Do you?"

"What?"

"Have a thing for me?"

"For fuck's sake, no. Why does everyone seem to think that?" He raised the cigarette to his lips.

"Because they have good reason to," said Kai.

Yuriy closed his eyes, debating something with himself. "Right," he said defeatedly. "Guess it does come off a bit like that. I mean...I thought that too," he said, those last words falling in volume. "I think I just...don't want to lose you boys."

"You don't act the same with the other guys."

"Especially," he rushed to add, "you."

Kai shut his mouth.

Yuriy sighed exasperatedly, the frustration directed mostly inward. "When Yelena didn't come home last Christmas, the house was so fucking empty with just mom and me in it. This big fucking cavern with no people in it. You boys with your big ass families won't get what that's like."

Last Christmas was the first without Tala's grandmother, who had passed earlier that year. The Valkovs were small in number with only three members left. They chose to spend Christmas together, keeping it a small affair as neither of the two matriarchs in the family were fans of lavish eve parties, unlike the Hiwataris who threw grandiose ones on every holiday and invited every powerful Christian to celebrate the birth of Christ with them. The Petrovs, Kuznetsovs and Papovs were regular guests at the Hiwatari estate during the season and so all the boys were together on the big day except Tala who celebrated with his closest family members alone. Last year, when his sister chose to spend Christmas with her boyfriend in London, Tala and his mother had had to open presents all by themselves.

"Mom had half a mind to invite distant relatives to fill the rooms and it was just so fucking pathetic."

"You could have come to ours."

"And left my mother alone?"

"Could have brought her too."

"Yeah. Like I could ever convince her to spend her most important holiday with a bunch of strangers. You know what Christmas means to her."

"Family time"

"Yeah, family time. Only there's no family left. It's just us three, and now Yelena's being a bitch."

Kai's mind was turning. "May be all of us could get together at yours next year. Fuck Voltaire and my mother."

"You would miss out on a major opportunity to mooch up to your future father-in-laws for me? I'm touched."

Kai scoffed. "You know I don't give a rat's ass about those old men."

"No. You have your eyes set on druglords and mob bosses for some reason."

"It's not about the mob."

"Yeah, it's about what the mob offers. Fast cash and endless leeway. Greed is your god."

Kai shook his head. "Greed is my tool. It gets me places and serves well. Five million isn't security, it's a risk. We have two years to escape this prison and secure our futures. There's no room for self pity."

"What does that even mean?" Tala grumbled. "What are you going to do the next two years?"

"Buy houses."

"For whom?"

"Us and my parents."

"Kai" Tala said his name softly before turning around to lie on his front and prop himself on his elbows. "You have to slow down. Touch a few boobs. We won't be sixteen again."

Kai watched him pull on his cigarette wordlessly, then reached for it.


He had been touching boobs lately. Many in fact. He had even been with Hinami less than two days ago. Whenever he wasn't busy with schoolwork or fights, that was what he did. Talk to girls and seduce them.

He cut down on the drinking and swore off drugs, and doubled up on physical intimacy.

Sex was the closest Kai ever got to romantic love. He had other kinds of love in his life. Parental, however lukewarm it was. Maternal. Paternal - no matter how complicated his relationship with his father was, deep down the man still loved his son and he showed it in his own way (he had gifted Kai with a car on his fifteenth birthday. A metallic red Lambo. It was fucking beatiful.) Platonic. Brotherly. Sisterly, not so much, but Julia could be a sister.

He wasn't severely lacking on love. But he did face a scarcity of affection in his life. In that no one around him touched him casually. Yuriy did, sometimes. But he mostly kept his hands to himself. He wasn't a touchy person. Neither were the others. They rarely patted him on the shoulder or on the back. His mother rarely stepped within his vicinity any longer (And that wasn't her fault. It was his. He froze like a glacier when she came close because she had played a large role in creating the mess that was his head. He simply couldn't put that out of his mind and accept her love, which clearly wasn't deeper than her fear of Voltaire or her love for material things.) They weren't touchy-feely people who talked about their feelings often. Neither was he, but he felt its absence sometimes.

Perhaps, that was why Kai felt free when he was being physically intimate with a girl. Why he took his time with his partners - carefully petting them. Making sure they were comfortable and well taken care of. Using pillow talk as an excuse to exchange words of soft words of affection. He could get a girlfriend but that would make things complicated. He didn't have time for one. And he was pretty sure he couldn't commit to one. He tended to get bored easily. Moreover, he could never explain the blood on his hands or the skeletons in his closet and expect someone to not run for the hills or call the cops on him.

A girlfriend would be too much trouble.

This was easier.

He liked the flirting, the game of tug of war before they succumbed to the pull between them. He liked to shower praises and gaze at his partners because some of them were so goddamn beautiful. And he made sure they knew it. That he thought they were beautiful. He liked being gentle. Liked making love more so than he liked being rough, though he was rough, sometimes. It fulfilled some part of him that wanted to be soft and kind. To take care of someone and adore them without any of the hassle of a relationship.

Taking his time however did have its consequences when the person mistook his affection for real feelings and fell for him and asked him out on real dates. He rejected them politely, multiple times sometimes because they didn't believe him when he said he didn't like them enough to date them because he was a completely different person when he was in bed with them.

Hinami blinked her huge eyes at him in confusion when he turned down her invitation to a study date, the blush on her cheeks receding towards her ears as she processed his response. He stood at his locker, awkward as the tension between them grew uncomfortable. "I can't. I have a thing later."

"Yeah" she said dejectedly, lowering her head. "How about this weekend then? There's a Chem test on Monday. We could get together and prepare for it...together."

Kai shook his head. "Tala and I already have something planned for this weekend..." he winced internally. "I'm really sorry."

"I- It's fine, Kai-kun, don't worry about it. See you later." She smiled at him unsurely, then turned on her heel and left, shoulders slumped.

She returned, a week after, and asked him again. He rejected again. And Hinami got the hint, understanding dawning upon her because she was a smart girl. Hurt bloomed in her eyes, anger followed. She got upset, looked at him with scorn and never talked to him again.

This was the part he didn't enjoy - the breaking of hearts - something he would get used to before he turned twenty.

At sixteen however, it left him feeling cold and brutal. And he took that brutal storm with him when he went home that Spring. Having no means of escape from the hell inside of him he had no patience for anything anymore.


"Which college are you aiming for?" a chirpy, hopeful, sycophantic Wyatt approached him during a family dinner while he was taking a break in the washroom.

Kai barely acknowledged his cousin with a disdainful glance as he brushed past him.

Wyatt was the golden retriever in their family. Nothing ever seemed to affect him. He was younger than Kai and the other boys by two years and he followed them everywhere whenever he was home, mainly Kai. Trailing after him like a tail he wanted to cut off. It was a good thing that his oldest uncle's family lived in a different city and Wyatt went to a different school. Otherwise, Kai would have had one more problem to deal with.

He used to do this since he was a toddler and he was still at it. Looking up at Kai with stars in his eyes no matter how much he and his group ignored him, bullied him, or made fun of him. Fifteen and he still acted like a small kid when Kai was around.

"This is real sad," Kai said to him later that evening when Wyatt followed him to his part of the house. "How many years has it been and you still don't get it."

Wyatt stared up at him with a face devoid of humor.

He was worked up and exhausted and annoyed all at the same time when a thought arrived in his head. An idea to get rid of him once and for all. "You want to be a part of our group?" he asked. "Is that it? Fine. Do as I say and you're in."

The boy's eyes lit up like the night sky full of stars.

"There's a card in grandfather's study. Not the outer one. The inner office. Gold print on it, with a rose on the back. It's pretty conspicuous. Find it and bring it to me." He turned to walk away.

"Will I get to be a part of your group then?" Wyatt asked behind his back.

Kai stopped just as he was about to enter his room and turned to look over his shoulder. "Without a doubt."


"Did you come here straight from his office?" Kai quizzed Wyatt as soon as he entered the room.

He paused, eyes widening and wondering if he did something wrong. "No. I walked around a bit and went into other rooms before heading this way….Like you asked."

"Good. Give me your phone." Kai held out his hand for the device.

Wyatt walked further into Kai's opulent bedroom and stopped a few inches away from him, handing his phone over.

Kai navigated to his recent calls list and deleted the topmost number - his, and gave the phone back to him. "Call the number on the card," he directed towards the card with his chin.

"Oh! Right!" Wyatt dialed and pressed the phone to his ear, listening nervously as it rang.

"Hello!" he greeted when the operator picked up, looking earnestly at Kai for direction.

"I'm looking for a rose," Kai murmured in a low voice, arms crossed over his chest, the sleeves of his dress shirt rolled up. Tala sat on an antique chaise lounge nearby watching them amusedly, a crystal tumbler of whiskey in his hand.

"I'm looking for a rose," Wyatt said into the phone as instructed, his brows furrowing slightly with confusion.

"I would like five of your best," Kai instructed.

"I would like five of your best," repeated Wyatt, then listened for a bit as the operator spoke, and glanced at Kai again. "A...premium membership?"

Kai shook his head. No membership. It would be a one time thing. He gave him an address and told him to finish the call on his own and sent him away.

"I'm impressed. I didn't think you had it in you." spoke Tala when the door shut after Wyatt. "Calling for prostitutes?"

"High-end escorts. There's a difference. It'll get the runt off our backs and we'll have a night of pleasure. It's a win-win."

"You're fucking diabolical."

Wyatt didn't know what he had gotten himself into while stealing a hidden card from Soichiro's private office. There were cameras in every nook of that space recording everything and alerting the man himself when someone other than Soichiro crossed into his study. Kai knew about the card because he'd seen his grandfather exchange it discreetly with his guests during dinner parties. He wanted the card for himself and when he saw Wyatt, grabbed the opportunity to shoot two birds with one stone. The boys took the girls from the hotel to a boat before Wyatt could catch up to them and left him there on the coast. In the morning, a sad Wyatt received a call from his mother who had been informed about her son's actions by Soichiro. He had stolen something from his grandfather and when questioned about it he kept mum, not wanting to put Kai in trouble. Wyatt got sent back home immediately and when spring break ended he was enrolled into a strict boarding school.

Kai had poured himself a glass of vodka that night, intending to let loose and have a night of fun. But a few hours later, he got a call from an unknown number that ran his blood cold.


He was tangled in bedding, an escort's arm wound around his torso when his cell went off, blaring incessantly through his blissful sleep and pulling him awake. Kai detangled himself and sat up on the couch, squinting at the unknown number on the screen. The other boys slumbered on different furniture and parts of the bedroom with their partners of choice as Kai walked out of there and into the hall to answer his phone.

"Who is this?" he asked into the line, buttoning up his shirt with his free hand.

"I know you did it," a man's husky voice spoke into his ear. Kai's fingers froze on the buttons, not recognizing the caller, but sensing the hostile note in his speech. "You stole the guns," the man continued and his 's's hissed. Ozuma.

Kai resumed doing up his shirt. "I don't know what you're talking about," he said unceremoniously.

Ozuma chuckled darkly. "Funny. When I heard about the robbery and the killings, I knew it was you right away. A Kuznetsov warehouse gets hit? Men get shot down by the same guns that were stolen? There's a Kuznetsov in your circle of brothers and you've been stirring up a lot of shit lately. Too much of a coincidence."

Kai listened silently, his pulse beginning to pick up as Ozuma went on.

"You know, they're looking for you. A smart kid trotting around with machine guns? That's a threat they'll want removed."

"Are you threatening me?" he asked quietly, breathing erratic.

"I'm warning ya. They haven't figured it out yet. You know I'm not the best at keeping my mouth shut. When the big guys come around asking questions..."

"Go ahead and tell them," said Kai. "I'm not fucking scared." Despite his words, his heart was slamming against his ribs.

Ozuma snickered. "That's what they all say," he said. "Before they die choking on their own shit."

Kai cut the call, trying to regulate his breathing and collect his thoughts but they scuttled around his head, one faster than the other, beating his attempts to remain calm and think rationally. Sooner or later, the Yakuza was going to learn his name. They were going to find out where he lived. Who his family was. Then what? What were they going to do? Kill him? Kill his family?

Unlikely

Yet

There was a candle on one of the end tables. Kai moved towards it in the dark, breathing panicked and laboured, a vein throbbing in his temple as fear attempted to lock his body down. He tripped on a stray item of clothing right as he was about to reach the table and his hand caught the edge of the wood to break his fall.

The flame burned hot when he held his palm above it, reddening the skin till it blistered. The pain quietened the chaos in his head and concentrated his thoughts to a point. The circle of epidermis being burned away. The fire seared through his skin, his arm, muting out everything else other than its sharp bite. He took his hand off the candle when the worst of it passed - the first few crucial seconds - and breathed out in relief when tranquility washed over him.


A/N: I was tempted to make this 10k but I figured stopping here would be better. Question: do you prefer shorter chapters or longer ones? would you like the next chapter to be ~10k?

Tyson will show up soon if you were curious about that.

Big hug to Becso for sending a long ass, huge ass, gigantic ass review on a bunch of chapters. Constructive criticism is always welcome. I can never get enough of those. They keep the story from getting convoluted. Thank you. I hope you are well. I will be writing to you AGAIN soon.

Hope everyone is taking care of themselves. Stay safe. Those who have been around since the beginning, thank you for not losing faith in me. And for newer readers: bebés, the best is yet to come.

Feel free to leave your thoughts. Bye bye! Love you x