Chapter Text
A fat ginger cat had knocked over his Philodendron, and there was soil on the wooden floors in a wide arc that swept from the broken pot. There in the centre, like a king on a throne, lounged the smug looking cat. Its tail flickered as Hisoka approached, but it otherwise didn’t move.
He’d loved that plant.
When Hisoka decided that staring the cat into guilt wasn't working, he went to pick it up. In some kind of protest, it lay there, uncooperative but apparently too lazy to put up any fight other than a disgruntled mewl. The tag on the collar christened the fat cat Gingerbread, and the address was Hisoka’s neighbouring apartment. The recently occupied apartment that was so silent that he had wondered if anyone was actually living there.
Hisoka was familiar enough with the other tenants of the building, such as Mrs Pilowski, who had custody of her kids on the weekends. John, who sold hard drugs sometimes. Amy, who got angry whenever questions were asked, but loved to gossip. Louis, who liked to let people know that he went to the gym. He hadn't yet had the opportunity to meet the newest addition to the building, but it seemed that fate had come calling in the form of an overfed feline.
Hisoka carried the fat, squirming cat, and knocked on the door.
The man that opened it wasn’t what he had expected. For one, there wasn’t anything obviously wrong with him. Secondly, he just held out his arms, as if he had expected to be handed his fat cat. He was also gorgeous.
“Thank you.” He said, with a quiet, distinct voice. The cat nestled into his thin arms like it hadn’t just ruined Hisoka’s favourite plant and then squashed soil into his floor.
“That’s quite a cat.” Hisoka said.
“Yes.” The man said, and shut the door firmly in Hisoka’s face.
He stared at the door for a few moments. When it became clear that he really had just been left in the hall without so much as a polite introduction, he went back to his own apartment to clean up the murder scene of his Philodendron.
-
“Have you met the new tenant?” John asked as he rolled a cigarette. Hisoka didn’t know what was in there, but it certainly wasn’t tobacco.
“Briefly.” He replied, fiddling with his pencil. He didn’t know what to draw, or where to start.
“I heard he killed a man, and left the body in one of the dumpsters outside.” John said, which paused Hisoka’s fiddling.
“And where did you hear that?”
John snorted. “Amy, of course. Where else?”
Where else indeed. The new neighbour didn’t seem like the murderous kind, but then Hisoka had been wrong about these things before. He drew one big, black eye, and then the fall of straight dark hair. Thin, arched brows, a straight nose. A small, lax mouth.
John peered over his shoulder and squinted at the paper. “Yeah, that’s him. Weird looking isn’t he?”
“In a good way.” Hisoka said, staring at the page. There was something missing, but he hadn’t had long enough to look properly.
“Yeah, a good way.” John agreed. “You gonna ink that on someone? Just a random guy’s face?” he asked, gesturing at the drawing. “I mean it’s good, but would someone pay for it?”
“People pay for anything that they’re not sure they should have.” Hisoka said. “But no, this is just a sketch.”
“You trying to find your mojo?”
His lips twitched. “Something like that.”
-
The fat cat was back, but this time sat in a pile of feathers. Hisoka’s pillow was the latest victim, and the criminal was unrepentant.
It purred when Hisoka hauled it up, but looked happier still when it was once again handed to its owner. Ah, so that’s what Hisoka had missed. The shadow of writing on the side of his neck, and the ball of a vertical labret through the soft looking bottom lip.
“What’s your name?” Hisoka asked, passing over the cat.
“Illumi.” The man replied, shutting the door on Hisoka once more.
-
“We’re going to war again.” Machi told Hisoka, sat on the chair meant for customers as Hisoka disinfected his hands and put on latex gloves. He had time to touch up the ace of spades on the inside of his wrist, in black and maroon ink.
“Oh? Any particular, exiting reason?” he asked, only half concentrating.
“Chrollo is back.” And that made him pause.
His eyes slid up to meet Machi’s own gaze, his attention recaptured. “That doesn’t answer my question; it just leaves me with more.”
She shrugged delicately, lifting her shirt just enough to graze the holster around her waist. Hisoka tried not to let his eyes linger.
“I can’t explain anything more. After all, your loyalty doesn’t lie with us.” Machi said.
Hisoka couldn’t keep the grin from his face. “Sweetheart, what does loyalty buy you? Does it keep you in clothes; does it put food in your stomach? Does it keep bullets in that gun you’re doing a terrible job of hiding? Or does it lead you into battles that aren’t your own, for causes that aren’t your own?”
“It leads you where you choose.” She said, grimmer now. “Chrollo will visit soon, for a tattoo and outside business.”
“I look forward to seeing him.” Hisoka murmured, staring down at the tattoo of the ace on his wrist.
-
Nameless men met him in shadowed alleys and passed him hushed whispers in exchange for safety, for a petty redemption he knew full well he could never give. He received answers to the questions people had yet to ask, and asked questions that were yet to have an answer.
When he went back to his building, he could see the light shining from Illumi’s apartment window. If it had the same layout as Hisoka’s, it was the bedroom. He waited a few minutes to see if Illumi would look out, but he didn’t.
Hisoka drifted into sleep with his secrets and questions and answers, and his fingers twitching with the need to trace lines across that pale skin on the other side of the hall.
-
“I slept with the new tenant last night.” Amy said to John as they lounged on her couch. Hisoka couldn’t remember why he’d accepted the invitation to join them.
“Fuck off, no you didn’t.” John snorted. “Why you gotta bullshit all the time Amy?”
“I did!” she insisted. Hisoka could feel her looking at him, but he was reading his emails on his phone. “It was amazing. He’s so sensual, you know? Those long legs and toned arms. And that hair.”
“Yeah? Prove it.” John said.
“I looked out of his bedroom window and saw Hisoka coming in at half past two. Isn’t that right, Hisoka?”
The lies had been amusing for a while, but Amy needed to find someone new to tease. Even John wasn’t stupid enough for it to keep on working.
“If you were at the window, I certainly didn’t see you.” He said. “But you have the apartment under his, so you could have easily seen me from your own window.”
John smiled triumphantly, but Amy looked annoyed. “You never take my side anymore.” She said, pouting.
“I get bored of sticking to the same side.” He said, easing the blow with a wink. “You’ve always known that.”
-
“What do you do, Illumi?” Hisoka asked as he handed over the cat for the third time. He knew now that it was climbing on the drains and in through his window, but if he left it closed, what excuse would he have to see his neighbour?
“I am a Contractor, of sorts.” Illumi said, dragging a slim finger down the nose of the cat. It looked up at him with adoring eyes.
So was Hisoka, of sorts. He liked that ambiguous ending, and the heavy weight of Illumi’s black hole gaze.
“Anything interesting?”
“Not really.”
“So you haven’t killed anyone and left the body in the dumpster?”
Illumi didn’t blink. “Not since I moved into this building, no.”
When he closed the door, Hisoka was smiling again.
-
People argued outside of his shop. It was a frequent occurrence, and as both of his businesses insisted upon a degree of certainty, he couldn’t blame people for lingering outside of the doors and attempting to persuade or dissuade each other.
“We need to stop at Mac’s before we go inside. Hisoka doesn’t like guns in his shop man, I’m telling you. You need to be the right person, and we are not that.”
The reply was quiet and cocky. “Yeah, whats he gonna do? Everyone is scared of the guy, but I don’t get it. He’s creepy, but what else? Besides, I’m not planning on using it.”
“Doesn’t matter. I’m not going in with you unless you get rid of the gun first.”
“I don’t get you, Harry. It’s not like he could kill us- it’s broad daylight, and we have protection! And he’s not affiliated with any of the gangs, so we won’t have to answer to anyone on the off chance that something does happen.”
“Some things are worse than death. You ever heard of Togari? He was an officer with a grudge against Hisoka.”
“Never heard of him.”
“Exactly. Two years ago he was on the path to becoming chief. And then nothing. Not from him, his family, or the cops. You don’t fuck with Hisoka.”
Out of all of the arguments he had heard over the years, that one was probably the most reasonable.
You don’t fuck with Hisoka.
-
When someone knocked on his door, he was hoping it would be Illumi. Earlier that day, he’d found Gingerbread on his kitchen counter, and had yet to return her.
Instead, it was two children, one with a suspicious gaze, and the other with an angry pout.
“Give me my cat back.” The tallest one said, his voice as petulant as his face. His white hair was a static cloud, and it looked utterly ridiculous. And yet the authority with which he spoke was certainly something interesting.
“That’s not very polite.” Hisoka said, leaning against the doorjamb. The smaller one with the fringe hadn’t lifted his eyes further than Hisoka’s knees, which was kind of cute. Shy. How sweet.
“Stealing a cat isn’t polite either.” The white haired boy snapped, his cheeks turning pink in the face of Hisoka’s idle attitude.
“I don’t have your cat.” Hisoka said, spreading his hands in a helpless gesture.
“You do.” The boy insisted. “She’s big and ginger. I know you have her.”
Hisoka smiled again, endlessly amused by children and their black and white ideals. He liked to stamp those ideals beneath his feet and watch their little world crumble. Bonus if they cried. He bent down, putting his hands on his knees so that he was eye level with the boy. “Listen, I don’t have your cat, okay? Why don’t you run along and... Oh, I don’t know. What do kids do these days? Algebra?”
The smaller finally spoke, though it was still aimed at Hisoka’s knees. “It’s Killu-ni’s cat, Illu-ni just keeps her safe. Please can we have her?”
Hisoka pursed his lips. “What’s my prize?”
“You’re meant to be an adult!” the elder shouted. Completely different to his elder brother. What would it take to make Illumi shout?
“I am an adult.” Hisoka replied. “So I make the rules. What do I get in exchange for the cat?”
He looked up when a shadow fell over the kids, and found his prize stood there with that lovely flat expression. Illumi’s hair was tied into a high tail, and Hisoka could see that it was buzzed short on the sides. He hadn’t known that when it was down and in a middle parting. Little details and all.
“May we have the cat?” Illumi asked.
Hisoka’s smile grew. “I still need something in exchange.’’
The poor little cloud-haired boy looked ready to scream or combust. The smaller one drifted closer to Illumi, who looked to be considering Hisoka’s words carefully.
“What is it you want?”
“Let me take you to dinner.” He found himself saying.
“I don’t think that would be appropriate.”
Hisoka moved back, hand on the door. “Then I guess I’m keeping the cat.”
Illumi’s quick hand stopped the door from closing fully, and Hisoka offered no resistance when it was pushed back open. Illumi had a tiny silver ring on the little finger of his left hand, a fire opal in the middle. There was something written in script down the side of his index finger, but Hisoka didn’t have time to make it out before Illumi’s curiously beautiful face was clouding his sight.
“Give me the cat, and you may take me to dinner.”
The smaller child made a noise of protest somewhere behind Illumi, but Hisoka didn’t bother looking, as the details of Illumi were far too numerous and engaging for him to look anywhere else. Thin lips, but sensuously shaped. Small ears, pierced twice in the lobes on both sides. Tattoos that Hisoka could only glimpse at before they were again out of sight. Eyes so dark that they looked almost all pupil. Calluses and scars that spoke of something other than… contracting. Spoke of danger. Illumi was a liar, and as Hisoka had just seen, he was also fast. It was an intoxicating mixture of mystery and threat, and Hisoka was well known for his love of all things wrong.
“Friday?”
“Friday.” Illumi confirmed. He didn’t speak again until Hisoka had passed the cat over, stroking one finger over the flickering ear. He looked to Hisoka again. “Thank you. I hope this game of yours is worth the outcome. I’m not sure it will be.”
Oh, but Hisoka doubted that.
-
“You fixate on things far too easily.” Machi complained on Thursday evening. They didn’t often go for drinks, as Machi worried about what she would let slip if she became intoxicated. Hisoka didn’t blame her.
“I do not.” He protested mildly.
It was a lie, but weren’t most of the things he said?