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It’s snowing outside.
Hanawa sits at the low table in the middle of the room, flipping through a stack of documents and idly thinking about the fact that they call it a safehouse, despite the apartment being as standard as they come, identical to every other 1LDK in suburban Aomori. Granted, this one has a bit more living space than the typical layout, but to compensate for that perk, the building’s location leaves much to be desired, sandwiched between the train tracks and a highway overpass.
For Daidoji, though, it doesn’t get any better than this — one of his best finds, Hanawa thinks with a slight swell of pride in his chest. Ample room, private, easy commute. The neighbors seem like the sort to keep to themselves, too; aside from the occasional hurriedly closed door, Hanawa rarely sees evidence of them coming or going. Then again, he figures the Faction must have investigated thoroughly before putting the two of them up here for an entire winter. Well, he hopes. No one’s come around prying, at least, and that’s good enough for him.
In any case, it won’t be long now; a few short weeks, and he and Kiryu will be heading back to the compound, ready for whatever the Faction has in store for them next.
Hanawa sets the documents aside and leans forward onto his elbows. The paperwork is nothing too demanding—the routine monthly review of their financial accounts—but tonight he finds it especially hard to concentrate, restless and unfocused as he waits for his agent to return from the evening’s assignment.
The job isn’t anything special either, just a one-off escort gig the likes of which Kiryu does several times a week in the stretches of quiet time between their meatier assignments. But coming on the heels of last week’s fiasco? It’s no wonder Hanawa’s been on pins and needles.
They’d finally found him, days later, collapsed in the back of the big underground parking garage downtown. Something of a novelty here in Aomori, though it’s nothing special at all by Tokyo standards. Kiryu had lain there curled up on his side, mostly concealed behind the dumpsters, but threatening to bleed out into full view of the morning commuters. It was hard to tell how long he’d been there. Several hours, the man himself had said, yawning and bleary after the administered treatment, but Hanawa didn’t believe him.
For all of Daidoji’s reputation, the organization has lost people before, though as one might expect such events are exceedingly rare. Hanawa’s thoughts naturally drift back to his early days with the Faction, back when he was a newbie with his own assigned handler. That short stretch of time between his old life and his current one.
News of Shimizu’s disappearance had spread like wildfire, even in a tight-lipped organization like theirs. How much damage had been done? Whose neglect was responsible? What would be the punishment? Because there would inevitably be a punishment.
Was it even an escape attempt, or a classified mission made to look like one? Or perhaps something more sinister?
Weeks later, when they found what remained of him, they got their answers. It was no escape attempt.
And Hanawa never got another handler.
He hadn’t thought of Shimizu in years. The incident is in the past now, his neatly compartmentalized past, but for some reason tonight he can’t help but fear the worst, even with the crisis firmly behind them. Mortal danger averted and fallout contained to only a handful of reprimands from the higher-ups. In all honesty, not all that different from most weeks for the operative formerly known as the Dragon of Dojima.
Hanawa picks up the mug of tea from the coaster, takes a sip, grimaces when the cold liquid hits his tongue. It’s time for another one, but he doesn’t dare get up now; he wouldn’t want to miss the door.
Kiryu is only late by half an hour or so, not at all significant in the grand scheme of things, but it’s a miserable wait anyway. Every minute Hanawa spends alone, without the ability to monitor him, feels twice as long as usual. Rather, he has the ability to do anything he wants, but too much contact can jeopardize a job just as easily as no contact, so he keeps his impulses in check. Instead, he bounces his foot, chews on his lip, rereads the checking account’s perfectly acceptable statement balance for the tenth time.
And then— a sound.
He knows exactly what it is. He’d know Kiryu’s heavy step anywhere, but it’s especially prominent here, on the metal walkway leading up to the apartment door. Hanawa glances at the security cameras anyway out of habit, something inside him unwinding at the sight of the conspicuous dark figure that fills the frame. Even back at the Temple, Kiryu does a shit job at concealing his movements. But that’s what got him into last week’s mess to begin with, isn’t it? It’s only natural to worry.
As he listens to the man fumbling with his keys outside, Hanawa makes no move to get up and greet him, opting to remain seated at the table. It’s less of a conscious decision and more of a compulsion that seizes his body; sit here, wait, let him come in on his own terms. There’s no debrief necessary, not tonight anyway, but he knows Kiryu will likely give him all the details as they go through their overlapping evening routines. He always does. It’s not something Hanawa’s used to, sharing quarters this close for this long, but two months is enough to become at least a little accustomed to anything.
“Hanawa? You okay?” asks Kiryu, walking into the main room.
And just like that, Hanawa knows he’s slipped up. Even behind closed doors, he shouldn’t be letting himself get caught off guard like this. Still, it’s an odd sort of evening; he can’t control the way he freezes up, swallows, shifts around in the few inches of room that he’s got under the low table. “Mm. I didn’t hear you come in. How did it go?”
“Fine,” answers Kiryu, seemingly unbothered by the lapse in vigilance from the man whose job it is to be vigilant enough for the both of them. He places the plastic bag in his hands onto the kitchen table.
Even from his awkward viewpoint, Hanawa has no trouble identifying its contents: more of that konbini garbage that Kiryu chooses to eat over home cooking. Subpar onigiri, fluffy melon bread void of nutrients, the occasional container of oden — slightly more respectable, but still a far cry from a proper meal.
“Would you like some tea? I was just about to make more,” offers Hanawa in a clumsy attempt to revive their usual evening habits. He doesn’t bother to reprimand Kiryu about his culinary decisions—a futile endeavor if there ever was one—but he’s particular about tea, and Kiryu has always understood and respected that.
“Please. Do we have any genmaicha left?”
Hanawa nods and gets to work.
The tea only requires a few minutes of preparation, but the entire time Hanawa’s mind is elsewhere, attention stuck on the sequence of sounds behind him: Kiryu changing out of his suit, Kiryu rummaging through his suitcase, Kiryu humming an unfamiliar tune. He listens for any telltale signs of injuries, and then huffs out a satisfied breath when he doesn’t hear anything out of place.
When the tinny chirp of the timer jars him out of his thoughts, Hanawa finishes his preparations and carries the two mugs back to the low table, ready to slip back into his unfocused introspection.
But as always, Kiryu doesn’t make things easy. “I can hear you thinking from across the room,” he says, smirking. “Did something happen?”
Hanawa shakes his head. “It’s nothing. Everything was quiet today.”
“Alright.” Kiryu’s oddly quick to acquiesce, but doesn’t look particularly convinced.
“Got some paperwork done ahead of time,” offers Hanawa for lack of anything better to say.
“Mm,” his companion voices ambiguously.
Even after all this time, there are moments when he still finds Kiryu impossible to read. That earlier smirk is nowhere to be found anymore, but Hanawa doesn’t take it as a sign of boredom — not with the way Kiryu’s eyes linger on his own for a second too long, watching him closely with an indecipherable—but curious—look on his face. Leagues better than what Hanawa sometimes sees reflected there.
Kiryu continues to sip his tea, relaxing against the back of the floor chair. His expression is open, earnest. Comfortable in Hanawa’s presence — tonight, at least. (But could he be imagining it? Always a possibility.)
“It’s good.”
“Hm?”
“The tea,” clarifies Kiryu. He looks down with a minuscule grin on his lips, as if sharing a secret with the drink in his cup. “It’s just the thing to warm you up on a night like this.”
Hanawa watches him take a bite of melon bread—he knew that was what it was—and chase it with another mouthful of tea. It reminds him to take another sip of his own, but again it’s a cold one, the very last one. Has it been that long already?
When he looks up, Kiryu is watching him again.
“You should get some rest,” he says softly. “You look like you need it. And tomorrow’s gonna be another late night.”
Hanawa knows, of course. But when he stands up and moves to pick up his mug to take it to the sink, Kiryu stops him with a jarring touch of fingers around his wrist.
“Let me,” he says. “I’ll take care of it.” His voice is grounded and steady—always is—but his hand shakes a little, fingertips ghosting over the sensitive skin of Hanawa’s pulse point.
He lets go just as quickly and then Hanawa’s set loose again, untethered in the space around them, which suddenly feels too big and too small at the same time. But not uncomfortable, in spite of it all.
He can’t be sure of Kiryu’s intent. Did he mean to touch him? Did he mean to let him go?
Would it even make a difference?
Kiryu looks up at him from his cross-legged position with that same grin that had been there earlier. The one that’s warm and barely there and so very Kiryu.
No. No difference at all. Hanawa lets go of the mug with a polite nod in thanks.
Later, as he finishes his bedtime preparations and finally sets his sights on the narrow bathroom door off the kitchen, the only thing running through his mind is both woefully inappropriate and decidedly unnecessary:
It’s good to have him here.