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The first time Takasugi and Gintoki kiss, they are barely 16, months before their mentor was taken away from them. They had been sparring for a while, both because they were bored and because Takasugi was getting tired of Gintoki's comments. He had been teasing him more lately ,more than usual. Jokes about his height were constant, but Gintoki teasing him saying things like Girls like tall boys,you'll never get one if you stay like that,Hikusugi-kun or You will never reach your partners mouth if you don’t grow up was something totally new. Takasugi had grown even more tired, as impossible as it seemed.
Gintoki had been teasing him about it again, leading into another fight with little purpose or meaning.This time, Takasugi had won. 189 wins, 188 loses. They were laying on the floor when Takasugi found himself asking Gintoki why he wouldn't stop bringing girls and relationships to his jokes.
"It's funny seeing you getting mad" Gintoki replies "Or flushed. Shouyou-sensei said a few days ago we are on the usual age to start doing this kind of thing too."
"Doesn't mean I'm interested in it" Takasugi mutters. Not on girls,either ways he adds mentally. He didn't find the girls Katsura and Gintoki talked about attractive at all. He could view them as pretty, nice too, but he really wasn't particularly interested or curious about them or the idea of being with a woman like his friends were.
"You aren't? Don't you want to date anyone?"
The truth is that Takasugi did want to be with someone. He doesn't know when he started "liking" Gintoki, but he does know he likes to spend time with him, whether it's fighting or just talking. He sometimes imagines himself kissing Gintoki, the way he had seen men kiss their women in the village. He tries not to think much about it, but it really can't be helped, not if he keeps seeing Gintoki every single day.
Other times he views himself playing his shamisen for Gintoki at night, or taking his hand and walking with him through the forest instead of bickering like they normally do when they have walks together.
He doesn't realize he had spaced out till Gintoki speaks again.
"Well, do you?"
Takasugi isn't sure what pushes him,but he finds himself leaning in and coming closer to Gintoki's mouth. Gintoki doesn't flinch when their lips meet, but he makes a little surprised sound. It's barely a peck on the mouth, but he feels his face and ears heating. He's pretty sure that for all of Gintoki's talk about women and their bodies,this is Gintoki's first kiss too. ´
When they separate and he opens his eyes again, he finds Gintoki looking at him with a dumb smile on his lips.
"Took you long enough. I got sick of waiting for you" Gintoki mutters, before kissing him again.
✻
The day had been a total failure. Some of his men would rot in the cold earth after today, others would be screaming in agony as the medics try to make the pain more bearable. He had not been injured, other than some scratches that he could easily handle them himself. As far as he knew, Sakamoto had not gotten any bad wound neither, nor Katsura probably. Gintoki was perfectly fine compared to most men, as usual. Even if Takasugi barely believed in higher figures, he found himself thanking the gods that they had all made it out in one piece from today's bloodshed
He and Gintoki had been quiet for a while now, each one of them cleaning the dried blood from their bodies in a river nearby the camp. The sound of the water flowing,their hands rubbing their dirty skin and the voice of some of their comrades in the distance filled the silence between them. Takasugi had been cleaning the dirt from his nails when Gintoki finally spoke up.
"You've got a bit of blood in your back, next to your left shoulder" Gintoki pointed out. Seeing he got no reply from Takasugi, he carried on "Come here"
Without much protest, Takasugi stood up from where he was kneeling next to the river and went to meet him. Gintoki made a little gesture, asking Takasugi to turn around to see his back properly. Gintoki bent down and rinsed the cloth in the river and raised his hand to put it on Takasugi's body. Slowly and carefully,Gintoki began to clean the blood from his back. Once he was done, Takasugi felt Gintoki's lips leave a chest kiss on his nape, and then Gintoki's hair on the crook of his neck,tickling him a little.
"Can you help me clean my nails too?" Gintoki asked in a little and muffled voice. And so Takasugi did, without missing to kiss the back of his hand once he finished.
✻
Painkillers and bandages were no use to ease the pain that came with losing his mentor and his left eye within seconds. He had been in the infirmary
they had in the camp for two days now. He knew other men certainly had it worse, he could see it in the desperate screams from the man next to him that had lost both of his legs during a battle. Yet he couldn't help but sink into misery and hatred as he laid in his makeshift bed. Spending the days at bed, waiting for the scar to close, had made a toll on him. Whenever he closed his other eye,he would see the scene all over again and Gintoki's crying face. Still, sleep came like a blessing to him at night, his body probably too tired of trying to heal. Tonight was no exception.
As he was finally dozing off, he felt someone walk towards his bed. He didn't have to open his eye to know who it was. He could have recognized Gintoki’s footstep or even breathing blind.
Still, he doesn't open his eye, he's too tired and miserable to face Gintoki, not now or any time soon, so he just pretends to be asleep.
What he doesn't expect is to feel a little and quick press on his forehead. He tries to not make any sound or a face that will expose that he's indeed very much awake now. But he can tell that Gintoki is well aware he’s not sleeping yet. In complete silence and as fast as he came, Gintoki stands up and leaves.
Takasugi opens his eye to see his back become more and more little in the dark of the infirmary . He doesn't see him around the next day, or the following day,or the next week.
He doesn't see him in years after that.
✻
Their first kiss after years of separation and mixed feelings comes when they're on the boat. They had been talking and planning when Takasugi suddenly had coughing fit. Gintoki's hands were on his back, rubbing it trying to soothe him. Takasugi's surprised to find himself not disgusted by it, he rather finds it pleasant, nicer than he would ever admit. When Takasugi stands again, he meets Gintoki's eyes, full of concern.
"Don't look at me like that" he muses "It happens, it's okay for now" It really isn't, he's sure about that, but he doesn't know if he can handle Gintoki fearing for his sake or pity right now.
"Doesn't mean I don't worry about it" Gintoki replies back. He comes a little closer. "Shouldn't we go to the stern of the ship and ask for the doctor?"
"No. I told you, it's fine. It comes ago, you've seen it a few times already, haven't you? It has passed already" He tries to sound as convincing as possible, both for Gintoki and himself.
"Okay" Gintoki says, he takes Takasugi's hand, which seems startling to both of them. He doesn't want to think that Gintoki had made that gesture out of reflex, confusing for a second their currents selves to who they were a decade ago. A decade ago Takasugi wouldn't have removed his hand from Gintoki's, and to his own shock, he doesn't do it now either. He looks to the other side, not wanting to see what face Gintoki might be making,nor their hands together for the first time in years.
They stay like that for a while, talking even as they hold hands,as if they were the two flushed teenagers they were years ago again.
Days later after that, Gintoki kisses him in the dark of their now shared bed.
"Will you get mad if I told you I missed this?" Gintoki asks,almost whispering. No, no he wouldn't
✻
As soon as he saw the light of Takasugi's eye leave, Gintoki took a deep breath. He thanked the gods that he didn't have to close Takasugi's eye himself, he wasn't sure if he could have ever brought himself to do that. The breath didn't ease the pain he felt on his chest, but it did help him keep him from starting sobbing. Still, he felt his cheeks wet and his hand shaking on Takasugi's now growing cold hand.
Slowly, Gintoki removed his hand from Takasugi's and brought it to Takasugi’s cheek to clean the blood from it and his lips. Once he was done, Gintoki kissed Takasugi's temple before resting his body on the floor.
He didn't have the time to grieve now, Takasugi had told him he had things to protect and he would do so. First, he would go get his kids, and once this all was over, he'd mourn his companion properly. He told himself that was what Takasugi would have wanted, but it still felt like he had lost part of his soul today.
He'd live for him, and as he promised, he would wait, as long as it was needed, to meet him again.
✻
Takasugi had grown the same way Shouyo did when Gintoki took care of him. Within weeks, he was already a kid, and in a month or so, he was around Shinpachi's age. Takasugi has to admit he felt all over the place seeing his body experience things he had not experienced since he was a careless teenager. However, he did have most of his memories, if not all. He could easily remember what he had done and what had happened to him before he had learnt the alphabet again.
Gintoki had gone to see him with Katsura after Matako sent them a letter explaining everything that had happened. He remembers Katsura's arms picking him up from where he was laying and Gintoki's teary eyes on him almost as if it was yesterday and not over 5 years ago. He's glad he had grown fast because he doesn't know if he could have dealt with Gintoki's remarks about how he had grown taller and faster in 3 weeks than in 10 years in his past life. Or Sakamoto wanting to feed him like a toddler, or Kagura treating him like the youngest brother he never had.
Looking back at it now, he's happy it was like that. He's more than thankful to have people he thought he had lost forever in his life again.
He was distracted from his thoughts when he suddenly saw Gintoki. Takasugi had been walking on his way to find him, after noticing he was not sleeping beside him. Gintoki was standing in the night, near a cherry tree holding a red umbrella. Takasugi smiled at the view, seeing Gintoki still carried the umbrella Kagura gifted him when he turned 36, every rainy day, no matter what. Slowly, Takasugi went to meet him. Without stopping to look at the trees, Gintoki said
"You are gonna get soaked if you keep walking in the rain with just a sedge hat, idiot."
Takasugi positioned himself by Gintoki's side, and smiled a little when he saw Gintoki come closer to him to cover both of them with his beloved umbrella.
"What are you doing here? Melancholic, are we?" Takasugi said ignoring his scolding from before. He knew other than their own home, this was one of Gintoki's favorite places in the world. All that there was around was the trees, the bridge they were standing in, and the river behind feet. It wasn't a illuminated part of the city, but it wasn't dark either. Mostly the moon and some red paper lanterns illuminated everything around them.
"You, among everyone, are calling me melancholic? As if you didn't pause playing shamisen to look at the moon for long?" Gintoki snorts "I just felt like having a walk"
"You could have woken me up"
"You looked like you could use some sleep. Growing old, needing rest and shit"
"We are 41 Gintoki, not 80" He smiles "And even if we were, I would still have not minded you waking me up" He wasn't lying, he really never minded Gintoki waking him up. Sometimes Gintoki would wake up in cold sweat or with lost eyes, like when they were still kids and Takasugi couldn't understand why Shouyou didn't want to give him an explanation to why Gintoki would wake up in such a state. He felt relieved and thankful that now Gintoki would not suffer it alone and would wake Takasugi up. Thankfully, nightmares stopped being so usual as time passed by.
"I know, I know that" Gintoki says softly "Told you. I just felt like a walk, to clear out my mind and all of that" Gintoki admitted once that when his mind was too filled with thoughts or when he couldn't fall asleep, he liked to go out and drink. The habit changed to walking or reading, as they grew older together. It's not like they've both stopped drinking, but he knows Gintoki won't go get drunk or make bad bets anymore.
"What's keeping you up and making you walk at 1am in the rain?"
"I thought that maybe.." Gintoki starts again "I was thinking that if you wanted, we could travel. Go somewhere new, maybe in the countryside. Or go with Sakamoto for a while. See Kagura too.The kids...they are no longer living with us, we could leave Tokyo for a while."
Takasugi isn't taken aback with the sudden preposition. He knows Gintoki loves the city he protected with all of himself, but he can also tell Gintoki changed when the kids left the home.
Shinpachi had been the first one to go, after spending almost 8 years with Gintoki, to take care of his Dojo. He did visit them, almost weekly. And Gintoki would often spend the day in his Dojo, seeing apprentices train or giving advice. Takasugi would go with him sometimes too, and he could see Gintoki's eyes filled with pride and joy whenever he looked at Shinpachi.
On the other hand, Kagura stayed longer with Gintoki, for over 13 years. Now she was working with Sakamoto and Mutsu. The three Kaientai members would visit them and Katsura as much as they could, and Kagura would send Gintoki's letters almost every week too. Most of Kagura's letters to Gintoki were filled with her adventures or stories about how Sakamoto messed things up, making the two men smile. Other times, she would write individual letters to Takasugi himself, asking how he was, or if Gintoki had been okay after her and Shinpachi's absence. Takasugi would often smile reading them, noticing how she had picked up some of Gintoki's slang.
Without thinking it much, Takasugi replies "You were worried about that? That I'd say no?"
"No, not at all" Gintoki chuckles "But we are settled here, we've finally got a peaceful life. We are okay here, aren't we?"
"We are, but it doesn't mean we won't be in other place." Takasugi replies. He glances for a moment the rain pouring outside their shared umbrella and then looks to Gintoki's face "We could ask Zura too to come one day with us too, if he isn't too busy with his government new plans" he smiles. "I'd like to go to the space with you, though. It's been long"
"Really? Thought you would have preferred us to retire in the countryside. Typical peaceful poet life" Gintoki laughs softly
"It would be good,but we will have plenty of time for that when we are so old that your knees can't stand a fight"
"Even with the knees of a 92 years old grandpa I could still win you easily, Shinsuke"
"Not true. But that's not the point right now" He smiles a bit. "Wherever you go, as long as you'll let me, I will be there too"
Gintoki nods with a little smile tugging on his lips and leans on to kiss him on the cheek
"Let's go home for now" he whispers " 'Don't want us to get cold here" He leaves another kiss near Takasugi's right eye "We can think better about it tomorrow"
Takasugi nods, and like that, they walk home under their shared umbrella, shoulders brushing and with full hearts.