a/n: Inspired by Chekhov's "A Lady and Her Dog".
If there was something that Gintoki prided himself on, it was the fact that very few people could fool him. He looked straight into her eyes and saw there was no deception in her, that she had no desire to lie to him.
She was genuinely upset - perhaps not at him, necessarily - but at the abstract principle of the matter. Still - it didn't answer the core of the question.
Why would she care?
"Now, Tayuu," he said softly, bracing himself for the inevitable smashing of the bottle over his head. "That's neither here nor there. In what world would Gin-san be an appropriate man for any woman, much less a partner?"
Although he ignored things that were inconvenient, this was something he was far less inclined to pretend was true. He knew exactly what he had to offer to the world, and none of it was what a woman needed, even if he was an object of desire.
Women had always believed him different from what he really was, had loved in him not himself but the man their imagination pictured him, a man they had sought for eagerly all their lives. And afterwards when they discovered their mistake, they went on loving him just the same.
Had any of them ever been genuinely happy with him? Time had passed; he had met one woman after another and become familiar with each one of them, but had never thought of them as loved. There had been all sorts of things between them, but never love.
That was, until he had met her.
There were millions of beautiful women out there. She simply happened to have the most beautiful soul of all.
Tsukuyo poured another drink, and downed it again. "Just answer the question, Gintoki."
He tried to think of a way out of it, but could not. The seconds passed by, each one more excruciating in its slowness.
So he lied.
"Gin-san likes all of them the same, you know that," he said softly. "Nothing more, nothing less."
Her face was brightly flushed, but her eyes now carried a despair that was darker than any that he'd seen before. She swayed uneasily next to him, her cheeks pink and her movements unsteady.
"I see," she said tonelessly. "I'm sorry to hear about that."
The tension between them grew stronger by the second. She hiccupped, and looked up at him with those mournful eyes. He wished she would look away from him instead of this, as if he had committed some unspeakable crime. At that moment, he desperately wanted her somehow to revert back to the angry drunk that he remembered of days long ago, of days where Yoshiwara was not so modern and long before things had became so complicated in his heart.
She lifted her hand and cupped his chin tenderly, and it stung him more than any kunai would have in his head.
"I would have liked you ta be my first love, Gintoki," she said softly. "But I always knew you belonged to nobody. That's the kinda man you are. And... I'd rather die than ta take that freedom away from ya... "
"Tayuu, you're drunk," he said, and something inside of him crumpled and died a good death. "You don't know what you're talking about." Surely when they woke up they would forget all of this, just as efficiently as how they both kept this charade of friendship for years.
"You're right," Tsukuyo agreed, and there was that sad acceptance inside of her. "I am drunk. But Hinowa told me that I should at least tell ya before I start meetin' new people. Wouldn't be any good if I came there and led them on, before movin' on. We'd both be wastin' each other's time."
"Tsukuyo, listen. This isn't about you, it's about me. There's nothing wrong with you, it's just... "
His voice broke off, unable to finish his sentence.
What was he arguing about? What was he saying? This was ridiculous. What could he possibily say to this woman to make her understand?
The lines had become invariably blurred. He had known that was the case a long time ago. But how could he communicate with that hurting her feelings?
"Ya think I'm don't know that?" Tsukuyo said, her words becoming more and more slurred. Her hand dropped to her lap, and for a moment, he missed the warmth of it against his cheek. "Ya think I don't know what kinda person you are? Of course I know yer a lone wolf, like me. I just got a bit lonely, that's all... Maybe I'm weaker than you, but that's not yer responsibility to take care of. I'm just another woman, after all... "
"You're drunk," he repeated.
Her eyes drooped, and she started to chuckle. "Yer right, I am. But I don't mind. I have been workin' a lot lately... "
This was going horribly wrong. This wasn't going according to plan. She should've been smashing his head with that bottle of sake - and for God's sake, how he wished she would do it now, to end this terrifying whirlpool of emotions that he never wanted to feel. Why the hell wasn't she yelling at him and playing a nasty card game as she broke his fingers, one by one? That was the Tsukuyo he knew and loved best. Not the one that sat next to him, vulnerable and strangely beautiful.
Tsukuyo slumped over, her head, awkwardly placed on his shoulder. "Just a little while," she whispered, and he froze. "I've been so tired lately..."
"Of course," he said, his heart hammering as if it was about to leap outside of his chest.
All of this - this chat of wanting to be close to him, and prematurely accepting that she could not...
He'd never been this close to her before.
Not in a way that would result in something like this.
It was too much, too -
Soon.
"I'm sorry that ya have to bear my feelings," she said. "But I figured if ya could deal with Sarutobi for all those years, ya could deal with me tellin' ya once. Though I ain't going to say it again like her; I know better than to let a man tell me he doesn't want me more than once... "
Only by the sheer fortitude of his will did he keep silent.
It felt as if he was frozen hollow inside, with a million icicles piercing his skin. Unable to move backwards or forwards.
He could only sit there with her head resting there, his heart almost halting to a complete stop. Her mouth was only centimeters away from his, and he couldn't pull his eyes away. It was terribly -
Intimate.
The last time anyone had looked at him - in that sort of way...
He could barely remember when that had happened. And if it had, it certainly wasn't someone with her beauty, or her temperament, or character...
Slowly, her breath steadied, and her eyelashes stopped fluttering in the night air. Very carefully, once she fell asleep, he carefully pulled away from her, and carried her to inside the room where she would be safe, right before tucking a pillow under her head.
Once that was done, he left.
Refusing to dwell on it. He wouldn't. There wasn't any room or space in their lives for this. Whatever had possessed her to tell him of this -
It didn't matter. Feelings were feelings - and intangibly, whatever came of it, would be of no use.
There was nothing more he could do.
-x-
"Gin-chan, mushrooms are growing on you."
"Leave me alone," he mumbled, his hand over his face. "I had a late night, alright?"
Kagura pursed her lips. "But you always have a late night."
"So leave me alone," Gintoki groaned, pulling a pillow over his face.
This wasn't anything new in the Yorozuya household. The kids were starting to get genuinely sick of not getting paid, and so what happened more often than not was they would leave him behind if he couldn't wake up for a job.
"Sadaharu needs dog food, and it's your turn to pay for it, yes?" Kagura said, poking him in the stomach. "At least pitch in 300 yen, you stinky MADAO."
Grumbling complaints under his breath, he reached out for his wallet from his pocket - he hadn't bothered to change his clothes from last night - and handed her three coins, which she swiped cheerfully without thanking him.
"Yahoo! C'mon, Sadaharu!" she crowed.
The door shut behind her and then, finally, there came that blissful peace. It wouldn't last long, he knew - but it was there, and sorely appreciated.
Then the memories of what had transpired last name came crashing down on him.
An existential horror crept up on him.
He'd drank with Tsukuyo before, of course knowing the physical harm being that she would throw him around like a rag doll.
But last evening had been far worse. He'd essentially told her that she had no chance with him and had made her goddamn peace with it ahead of him. She'd given him as much notice as one of Tokyo's new shinkansen systems - leaving at the precise moment when she intended to move on.
Without him.
She was moving on, just like that - and he had no idea why he was the one who felt rejected. Wasn't this what he wanted? Had always wanted, for the both of them?
His chest started to hurt, and then he finally sat up, rubbing his eyes.
"Just get through the goddamn day, you son of a bitch," he muttered.
Melodramatic, but it allowed him to compartmentalize his thoughts, especially as he pushed the unwanted memories away while he got out of bed. With colossal effort, he reluctantly pulled his clothes on and headed downstairs - it was still early afternoon, and he was hopeful that he could put all of this behind him. And anyways, this wasn't the goddamn Scandal Arc. There was nothing to be sorry or take responsibility for! She had said it herself - he belonged to nobody but himself. A motto that had served him well enough, then and now.
No more going to that red light district to drink, he thought to himself. He would be courteous, but keep his distance from her.
He decided that the only thing to do for now was to play the slots until the sun came down. Maybe he'd see Hasegawa on the street and they'd scrounge around on the streets for change to pay for a small bottle of strong spirits. The stronger, the better.
As it turned out, he had an unexpected lucky streak at the pachinko parlor - but the increasing pile of tokens did nothing to cheer him up.
I should be happy, he thought. Why aren't I happy?
He kept playing until he was sick of it, and cashed all the little grey balls in because he wasn't a fucking idiot. The bills in his wallet weighed him down.
I hope somebody robs me, he thought savagely, but nothing came of it, and he considered turning around to return the money.
No, that wouldn't do. It had been years since he'd ever won big at pachinko.
Should he drink?
He would drink. Enough to forget everything that had happened.
Not at Yoshiwara, of course. He would keep his distance for a long time and forget that she had told him what she should have kept to herself.
Forget that he was a criminal in the eyes of the government. It was so much more than that. It was that he was the complete opposite of a person who she would have been proud of to walk next to. She was an - for all intents and purposes - an innocent woman who had only the faintest idea of knowing who he really was. She'd seen glimpses, but it wasn't... it wasn't the whole picture.
At the crux of it, she saw him as a hero. A flawed hero, perhaps, but a hero all the same.
And Gintoki knew he was far from that - never mind that too many courtesans already called him the Savior of Yoshiwara. He wasn't big-headed to assume that he had really saved this resilient town from a monster who barely deserved a grave. It was just something that happened, and he'd try his best to play it down whenever he was there.
That wasn't the least of it, though.
He'd never talk about his nightmares that haunted him for a decade. Would never dream of bringing the emotional monster that he hid carefully from everyone into her life. It felt like an invitation for him to ruin what they shared together - a friendship that peacefully coexisted on a mutual understanding of raising adopted kids, the humdrum of Edo life, and a secret understanding of losing one's masters.
To ruin that felt sacrilegious. He'd known - and surely, so should have she - that to take a step towards anything that could be construed as platonic - was dangerous.
He'd lost so many people in the past that he could barely bear the possibility of losing yet another one.
Like Patsuan had said once, he'd never been in a wholesome relationship. Not one that involved someone who most certainly had never been with a man before. There were courtesans in the past and occasional fumblings that never progressed anywhere beyond one night stands, before the children came into his life - but beyond that, there was nothing.
He'd spent so much time being alone, that to understand the gravity of sharing a life together seemed wholly foreign to him.
Gintoki took a sigh, and then found himself in front of a bar that he was unfamiliar with, somewhat far from the outskirts of Kabuki-chou. The outside of it was dimly lit, and it seem relatively uncrowded compared to his usual haunts this time of day.
It would have to do. He slid open the door, and made his way to a seat.
-x-
"Annnnnn - annnn I said, I said that I didn't see her that way, but the wors' part was, she didn't even seem surprised. I thought she was g'nna cry and hit me or s'mthing - but, but - "
Ten beers later, his mind spun round and round and his mouth was spewing absolute trash. The bartender was sociable and, being as the business was somewhat new and needed more loyal customers, was seemingly patient with Gintoki as he talked through everything. There was nobody he knew here and sometimes he needed that - to talk about things he couldn't tell anybody else.
"But?" the bartender prompted, still polishing a beer glass with a woolen rag.
"She just said, thank ya for listenin'. Whazza hell did she hafta do that, huh? Why'd she hafta tell somethin' like that?"
"What do you mean?"
"I mean," Gintoki slurred, already wishing he was at home already - "I mean, these things ruin a good friendship between men and women. N-now - " he hiccuped, "I can't h-help but to think about it. She didn't - didn't hafta say an'thing - "
He polished the rest of his beer, setting the glass down with an unsteady clack.
"Sometimes, sir, to move on, we have to tie loose ends. Maybe this woman wanted to leave no stone unturned, just to make sure you knew before she was ready to make a decision."
None of this was comforting him, and so Gintoki stayed silent. The bartender, who sensed that he was in no mood to divulge more of his secrets, wisely shuffled to another patron, who seemed much less miserable than he was at the moment.
No stone unturned...
That was very Tsukuyo of her, he thought bitterly. What had happened to the same woman who had told him she was content to remain by his side, be it spring or winter?
Trust her to be thorough and honest before she broke a promise.
You were unfair to her, he mocked himself. You lied to her and this is what you deserved. This is what you get for being a fool. Because you were never good enough for her in the first place.
And yet there was something dissatisfying about all of it - of the cheap beers, of the self-loathing that washed over him, of the way the Kabuki district stunk of old men and sleazy company - nothing soothed him, and he felt as if he was washed away by the natural progression of life.
On his tenth beer - or was it fourteen? - he had lost track of where he was, and a looming darkness came across him.
"There he is, girls." Very vaguely, he could hear Tae's voice over the din of the bar, but before he could run away from her, someone had put a hood over his head and tied his limbs with rope.
-x-
An hour later Gintoki found himself in a very dark building that seemed to be familiar. Someone took the hood off and he blinked blearily at the surroundings before he realized that he had been here before - but under someone else's alibi.
"Oh shit - "
Shimura Tae poured a bucket of water over his face, merciless and sadistic. "Awake already?"
He choked on the water, coughing before blinking furiously. He was dismayed to find that he was more sober than he wished to be at that moment.
"What did I do to you, woman! Can a man not even drink his sorrows away in peace!"
She glared at him, and then Gintoki wriggled his wrists and found they were unfortunately, tightly bound by a pair of... Handcuffs! Good God! He was sure that Tae didn't see him that way, but if she did -
"Don't get any nasty thoughts," Tae said viciously, and prodded her naginata near his neck. A pair of wooden clogs click-clacked behind her, to reveal Kyuubei who looked no less vicious.
"Really, I don't see why you deserve those two balls and a rod when you're less of a man than I am," Kyuubei said lightly, holding their sword and pointing the tip near his crotch. "Tae-chan, if you let me do it, I'll give him nothing less than he deserves - "
"Hey wait a minute! What the hell did I do to deserve getting tied up in this dungeon!" Gintoki yelped, realizing that he was in the same torture chamber in Yoshiwara a while back, when he pretended to be Fakesugi.
"Oh, nothing~ " a sickening, sweet voice echoed behind him, and he yelped as he turned his head around. A familiar and unwanted presence had turned up.
Sacchan for some reason was dressed in a red latex suit and was holding a very long whip. There seemed to be a maniacal glint behind those glasses, which scared him more than the other two girls.
"Sacchan, help me." Gintoki pleaded. He hoped that she would be more sympathetic to his plight than the others, even though contextually that didn't seem very likely at the moment. In that nanosecond of hope, he thought he would accept being her slave for a day if it meant that he wouldn't be castrated by Kyuubei.
"Oh? All those years that you've denied my feminine presence, and now you're finally asking me to help you?" Sacchan looked delighted, tapping her fingernails thoughtfully on her chin. "I didn't know you were such a submissive, Gin~ to~ kiiiii~ "
That did not sound promising.
"Unfortunately, I already have a sub, and he wouldn't be very happy if I replaced him without his blessing," she breathed, and she lifted his chin up with her leather whip. "We're doing wax play this week," she informed him. "But of course, you're very welcome to join us - "
"Never mind all that," Tae cut in impatiently. "Sacchan, did you have that electric collar?"
"Oh yes," Sacchan chirped happily, and rummaged through a bag of which contents Gintoki did not want to know about. After she fished out the item, she clamped it securely around his neck, with more delight than any woman ought to have.
"I believe we ought to start on setting three," Kyuubei said mildly, and flicked a switch on a remote.
Gintoki started to scream.
The electric shocks subsided as soon as they came, and he breathed heavily, before shuddering. "What the hell is this about! Is this another Scandal Arc that I've done?! If so, at least tell me so that I can apologize!"
The girls looked at each other, cross, and then looked back at him.
"I thought he was bound to confess," Tae shot at Sacchan. "You said her plan was foolproof."
"Well, it worked for me - "
"Not everyone has sex with their childhood friends an hour after getting drunk as a skunk, Sacchan - "
"Okay fine, you prude! But what do you want me to do - lock them up in an escape room? They've been oblivious for god knows how long - if this wasn't enough - "
Something was not adding up, Gintoki thought to himself. What on earth were they talking about?
"Enough with the chitter-chat," Kyuubei said gravely, interrupting the budding argument between Tae and Sarutobi. "This is serious business. Tsukuyo told me that she had an arranged meeting with a daimyo tomorrow, and this idiot here is drinking his life away, as if he doesn't think he's part of the problem."
"What does any of that have to do with me?" Gintoki asked indignantly.
All three of them glared at him.
"Set it on five," Tae said savagely, and Gintoki spent the next five seconds screaming at the top of his lungs.
Once he regained consciousness, he could barely tell if he was existing or not.
"Listen, you moron," Tae said, her voice as sweet as a Boddhisattva's. "If you think you had nothing to do with this, I'll sever your balls and give them to the Shogun himself. Tsukuyo is going to get married soon if you don't shape up. Does that make it clear?"
Gintoki was gasping for air at this point. "Who the hell would marry that drunk terminator anyway!"
Without a word, Tae gave a meaningful look to Kyuubei who cranked up the setting to ten.
This time, his vision went white, and he barely managed to hold onto anything before the torture was mercifully over.
He was alive, but just barely.
"Wow, they really don't call you a demon for nothing," Sacchan commented, as if she was completely unfazed with torturing an innocent man to death. "Anyways, she'll be at the Edo Theatre at seven o'clock tomorrow."
"What do you all want me to do?" Gintoki pleaded. "I can't compete with a daimyo - I can't compete at all, period! You girls are crazy!"
"First of all, I'm not a girl," Kyuubei said calmly. "And secondly, I think there's something to be said about a man who's saved her city, don't you think?"
"And while I certainly wish that our friend had better taste in men," Tae added, her eyes shifting into something kinder, "I see the way you look at her, and if all those shojo mangas have taught me something, it's that a man knows The One when he sees her."
"I wasn't going to let any regular old bitch claim you," Sacchan said, her hand set on her hip bossily. "She needs a dicking; God knows how much damn stress she's been under ever since you left Edo. And if there was one man on this planet she'd ever spread her frigid legs for, it would be you, unfortunately."
"That's really crass, Sarutobi."
"I don't care, because it's true," the purple-haired ninja said, tossing her hair haughtily over her shoulder. "And anyways, staying a virgin in that red-light district has to be deeply unnatural." She prodded Gintoki's cheek contemptuously with her leather whip, while taking off the electric collar from his neck, freeing him from most of his physical constraints. "You better take it soon, or you'll find out all the settings on this collar. Zenzou can go up to twenty, by the way."
"That's sick," he gasped, his body still weak. "And who the hell needed to know that!"
"Well, I believe our job here is done, my friends," Tae said cheerfully. "Now, Gintoki, I expect you to take a shower before tomorrow, because god knows those establishments won't take an unwashed, hungover, and unemployed patron. This is high culture, after all. In any case, we need you to look fresh for an omiai."
The girls started walking outside of the dungeon, leaving him behind.
"Wait," Gintoki pleaded. He felt lost and bewildered. "Can't you at least unlock these handcuffs?"
Tae laughed. "The key's in your apartment, next to your bathtub."
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- tbc
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