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Yukichi is thin, but wiry—his slender appearance belies strength that can move mountains. Genichiro has felt this strength himself, the full weight of the other boy pressed up against him while driving his sword against his own, every muscle in his body funneled into his shinai like water through cracked stone.
It would do well to not underestimate him, Genichiro thinks in these hot, adrenaline-filled moments, punctuated only by the strike of wood against wood. Far too often, he gets the feeling that he can only truly understand what’s going through Yukichi’s head during their daily sparring sessions.
Well. That’s the understatement of the century. Genichiro can’t truly understand anyone unless he’s fought them at least once. All of his opponents make their personalities known to him during matches, with the stance of their feet, their grip on their sword, their cry as they hurtle forward.
He can pinpoint them in seconds: That one, nervous. That one, boastful. That one, unmotivated.
Yukichi, silent as winter, breath coming out in short puffs. Eyes alight with something like excitement, maybe even hunger. Genichiro thinks that’s as close to the other boy as he’ll ever get, even when they share bunks at night and seats at the mess hall.
Even in the present moment, under the shade of a willow tree, Genichiro feels like he still can’t get close enough. He wants to just—press his forehead against Yukichi’s and maybe they can form a mind-link, like in that one American show that sometimes comes on the television at night, the one that they clumsily try to translate the plot of. Maybe, if he tries hard enough, he can split Yukichi open and crawl inside him, feel that short-breath exhilaration when they spar but forever and ever and ever.
He settles for leaning into the other boy’s side, so that their shoulders knock together.
“Do you wanna get married?” He asks, looking away. The weight of Yukichi’s stare, if placed properly, can bore holes into diamonds.
“What, like now?”
“Uh,” Genichiro says. “Can we?”
I was sort of thinking about when we get out of here, He doesn’t say.
I don’t know if we’ll still be friends when we’re done, He doesn’t say.
He looks over. Yukichi is also avoiding eye contact, eyes trained on the clumps of grass that he’s steadily pulling from the ground. It hits Genichiro that he could be embarrassed, too.
Strange, because he thought that Yukichi was never embarrassed, never felt the sting of shame, even when he’s being brow-beaten for being disrespectful post-match in front of everyone else.
“Sure we can,” Yukichi says, confident. “Some younger kids were doing it the other day.” He stops, and clarifies: “A boy and a girl.”
“How did they do it?” Genichiro asks. And is it okay that we’re both boys?
Yukichi turns to him, with a closed, expectant fist. Genichiro holds out his hands and he opens it, blades of grass fluttering down and into his heat-sticky palms.
“With these,” Yukichi says. “You tie them into a knot—like a ring.”
Genichiro has big hands, hands suited for combat, that know nothing but the handle of his shinai and the bent-sprung-wood of the dojo. The grass is fiddly and small, and it’s especially muggy today, humidity making him hide in the shade and occasionally swipe strands of hair out of his face. He hands the grass back to Yukichi.
“You can do it,” He says, as haughtily as he can manage. Yukichi huffs out a little laugh, one that blows his bangs away from his face. Score, Genichiro thinks, watching the other boy carefully tie the blades together into a little misshapen oval.
There’s a small gathering of those tiny white flowers that Sensei says are weeds next to his thigh. Genichiro plucks one of them away from the pack, and rolls it between his fingers so that little powder-pieces of dust and pollen stain his thumb and index. Yukichi presents the now-finished ring, and Genichiro places the petals in one of the hollow spaces where the grass isn’t knotted.
“There you go!” He exclaims, clapping his hands together. “Now gimme.”
“You’re impatient,” Yukichi says, obediently handing him the little loop of grass.
Genichiro takes his hand (soft, soft, chants a terrible little voice in his head) and carefully slips it on his ring finger. It doesn’t quite fit. It’s a little too big, so it sort of dangles uselessly, probably going to unravel in the span of five minutes. Genichiro can buy him a new one, in the future, when they’re both rich and famous and hopefully still together like this, side by side like always.
“Uh, I don’t know the vows,” Genichiro says apologetically, dropping his chin on his hand. “I never really thought about this until like, right now.”
“Me neither,” Yukichi responds, looking admiringly at his hand as he holds it up, framing it against the sky.
“I’ll just make it up then,” He says. “That’s fine, right?”
“We can finalize it later,” Yukichi says.
Later, thinks Genichiro. There’s a later. It rings out like bells in his head: Later, later, later. How soon? How far away?
“Um,” Genichiro asks, throat suddenly dry. “Okay. Do you, Fukuzawa Yukichi, promise to stay with me, Fukuchi Genichiro, in sickness and in health?”
“Yes, Geni,” Yukichi answers, confident and truthful as anything. Sunlight filters through the cover of the long, hanging leaves that shade them both, illuminating his face and hair like stained glass through a church window.
“And even when I hurt you when we spar?” He asks, because Yukichi hates getting knocked over.
“Yes, Geni,” Yukichi says. “And vice-versa.”
“And even when it’s cold outside and we have to huddle together?” He asks, because Yukichi is okay with being touched, but only so much.
“Yes, Geni.”
“And when we grow up, too? Will you stay?” He asks, tripping over the sentence like he did when he was a little kid, words all excited and jumbled in his mouth.
“Always, Geni,” Yukichi says. And that admission—it’s like a salve, to every burn and scrape and worry that Genichiro had about their future, about them separating and never looking back, maybe one day being distant strangers.
“Okay,” Genichiro says, clasping Yukichi’s hand in his. The ring breaks instantly from the pressure, falling apart into a pile of foliage that blends in perfectly with the rest of the grass. “Me too. Let’s stay together forever, ‘cause we’re married now.”
“Yeah,” Yukichi agrees. “Forever.”