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Denji glanced over his shoulder and frowned. “Ya coming?”
Reze paused, stopping what she was doing. Her hands were still lingering at her chest. Her fingers were still brushing the buttons. Denji refused to look at her for more than a few seconds. It didn’t feel right. It just didn’t.
He wasn’t sure what they were meant to do, but he was relatively sure that doing anything like that wasn’t gonna work out.
It would be better to keep walking.
Not stop and linger. Not… whatever it was that Reze was doing.
It wasn’t the smartest thing to do, even if they were in a little dim corner with no street light and no onlookers. Still, even now. Even here. It made his stomach curdle into tiny little sour pieces.
(Pochita had whirred to life, hadn’t he? Swallowed up by Denji’s dreams, his sudden anger—to be unknown, to be unwanted—always teething on something or another—but no one helped him, no one saved him. Reze had taught him how to swim. She had known how, mostly. Neither of them had gone to school, but they knew things anyway—education might be a sham. Not like thy could get one, anyway, in this kind of life. Runners and traitors and hiders. He got tremors in his hands, too, shaky at times—Reze grabbed onto his palms and squeezed his skin tightly late at night, like she could pop him open or pressurize him into staying whole. Denji sometimes wondered if Pochita could tell that he was happy, or of he was sad, or if there was a steady medium between the two emotions—teetering, never still.)
He couldn’t tear his gaze away from Reze. The snow crunched under his boot, and then under hers, too. He winced when their footsteps echoed down the street, practically clattering every which way.
“Yes,” Reze murmured, after a long moment. “I’m coming, don’t worry.” Her hands traced the buttons on her coat—Denji’s coat, that he gave to her—and then she let go and stuffed her hands into the pockets. Her face was very plain. Her breath swirled in the air. Denji wasn’t sure why she bothered with this kind of thing, even now—ever—maybe it was her type of… coping. She had plenty of reasons to be like this, he thought, even if he also thought it was a bit dumb. But whatever made her happier. Not like the two of them could be happy, so they settled. That was fine. Denji was used to settling.
Denji kept frowning. “Are ya?”
Reze’s face did a thing. She still smiled, though, and nodded. “Yes.” Her hair was in her face, hanging damp at her shoulders. She lost her last hair clip a while ago.
Denji shrugged, breath fanning out. He could feel Pochita in his chest, too, steady. His buddy felt like a paperweight in one of those fancy offices—on Miss Makima’s desk, maybe, holding something down. Pochita had never held Denji down, in comparison.
“‘Kay,” He muttered, and carried on.
The snow was piled up higher in certain areas. There was a permanent chill. It had already seeped into his bones, and he couldn’t feel his face, but you know. They were wandering down an unpopulated street. Snow wouldn’t start falling just yet, but it was sure to happen eventually. Winter was never kind. And, well, summer didn’t look any different than winter.
“Hey,” Reze said, easygoing and polite and not like the bomb girl he fought inside of a typhoon. “Are you hungry?”
Oh. One of those—she was implying something.
“I thought you said we should hurry home,” Denji grouched, only a little befuddled.
Reze kept walking, hands stuck in the empty pockets of a stolen—borrowed—coat. The damn pockets were empty because everything had already been framed into an envelope and slid to Reze’s who had probably deposited it, or done whatever it was she did with cash. Not like Denji had gotten used to counting it. He had gotten used to yen, but that had also taken longer than it should have—whatever. Reze showed him how to count the major bills, bit he mostly just shoved cash at whoever was working the register at the nearby grocer and hoped they were being honest and legitimate when they gave him cash back. Reze didn’t like that very much, but she never yelled or hit him—she just insisted on showing him the monetary values again until he could respond adequately.
(Gotta go home, said a boy with too big shoes and a lousy shirt. Pochita, do you know the way? Help me, please. I’ll let ya have the better side of the bed!)
“That was before,” Reze said. “Now, I’m hungry. I think we deserve a nice dinner. Don’t we, Denji?” Her face waned, shimmering like the moon.
The moon wasn’t visible. There were no fireworks. Pochita didn’t stir.
Man, I dunno, he thought, placid and utterly useless. Denji shrugged, “I guess?”
“Well,” Reze hedged, hair falling over one half of her face again. She talked about cutting her hair but never went through with it. Denji’s hair, too, was getting long. He didn’t think he would cut it, though. Maybe he would let it grow and grow until it was as long as Power’s, or so he remembered. Reze caught up to him. “Did you want to get something to eat?”
He had already answered, but he could say it again. Reze sometimes did that. Asking twice. Asking three times. “Uh,” and his brain blanked—so, of course, he made another face at her. “If you want to?”
Denji stumbled one step, glancing aback and forth between Reze and the street.
Reze liked walking on his left side. Even now, that was what she was doing. She smiled—didn’t visibly waver.
Maybe she meant it.
Reze looked at him. Her eyes glinted in the dim lights. The stars couldn’t really be seen. “I want to,” she said.
His coat didn’t look right on her. Too big. Hopefully it was keeping her warm, because it sure as hell wasn’t doing the same for Denji—especially with it no longer being on his body. His fingertips were turning blue. What was he, anyway? Had he never seen winter? Yeesh. His memory had gone right into the gutter after all the traveling and random bursts of fixing up old exhaust-pipes. Reze knew more about these kinds of things, technical applications and shit. Denji was better suited to sitting on the concrete floor of a warehouse and waiting until she was done with whatever odd job she scrounged up.
Reze did all the heavy-lifting.
Denji mostly stayed home, in the little apartment, and stared at the ceiling when she wasn’t around.
Sometimes he cooked. He thought of Aki, always cooking for Power and him—trying to keep them fed, mostly succeeding. He made random things for Reze, mostly, and she often indulged him even if the food looked terrible. Denji wasn’t a chef. They didn’t have unlimited electricity or heat. In this bad weather—summer—hah—not even summer, that had long since passed—fall had turned to winter and now the sink froze up. Reze always reminded him to leave each facet dripping, barely a liter lost in a week. Just enough to keep it from fully freezing, she would say, and then sometimes brush his hair from his forehead and get real close like she was going to kiss him or bite his tongue off again, only to pull away before he could go still or lean closer.
Sometimes, sometimes—old wounds, Denji healed pretty fast, like most devils and most devil-hybrids. His chest got achy every now and then. When Reze acted like the girl he met back in the phone booth, his chest hurt most of all.
I want to, said the real Reze.
I like you, said the Reze on a battered street, smoking hot in two ways, tangled with dynamite and covered in gunpowder—her eyes had vanished into a bomb.
But now, no longer then, Denji watched Reze late at night once in a while—by chance, mostly. There would be a dim light in the kitchen and he would be on the floor and he would look up and see a halo around her head. Laying on the floor, barely opening his eyes when he heard footsteps. He would see Reze peer into the fridge, sometimes grabbing a glass of water, sometimes not, and he would think, what a dream. Every now and then she would smile at him—a secret between two devils—the taste of blood between their teeth. She saw him in the dark, the glint of a dumb overhead light. Every now and then. Once in a while. Sometimes. Just for now. He thought she must be satisfied, to do all these things and never anything else. It made Denji feel odd. Lightheaded, sometimes, all the time.
“You do?” He asked, dumb—he had a bird-brain, and he wasn’t a bird. No feathers, no wings. Sometimes life was a cage. Sometimes people threw him a seed or two. Huh.
(Isn’t this fine? It’s good enough, isn’t it? We’re not bleeding out. That’s all we need.)
His mouth often opened and closed like a goldfish. He often stared out the window of their little apartment and watched the snow glaze over the cement and dirt and bare trees. The street lamps would flicker, golden and endless.
She didn’t kiss him—not since Japan—but sometimes Denji would dream of her mouth on his. Always sometimes, with them. He got fuzzy. He got sick. He thought about things, always blurry. The lines between reality and winter and what happened in those months, at the Crossroads—at the school, the deep pool—the glimmer of a web—the roof of a semi-truck—his mind whirred to life. He hoped, more than anything, that Pochita enjoyed the dreams hat Denji conjured up. Scrounged, like digging through a dumpster and coming home with wilted vegetables and browning cabbage leaves. Reze didn’t comment much on food he brought home from the trash. She mostly just asked what he planned to make with it—or if he was seen—or if he had showered after. Not that she ever seemed to care about cleanliness. She wasn’t like Aki in that manner, forcing hygiene—making sure it happened. Reze was nothing like Aki. Reze wasn’t family. Reze was the girl he liked, even of his feelings got messy. Hers were somewhat messy, too. Probably. He wasn’t sure. They didn’t really talk about it.
“Yes,” Reze replied. “I do.” She looked at him again. “Don’t you?”
Sometimes she would hand him old books in a language he obviously didn’t speak. She would often call him a dumb blonde, affectionate and venomous, but he at least knew that reference.
The apartment Reze got for the two of them was smaller than Aki’s. It felt very grey, but it was still better than the shack Denji grew up in. Reze said it was happier than her childhood home, too, and Denji nodded like he understood. She never explicitly said anything about growing up, so he didn’t really ask, but he liked the way she would come home with random things—cheap frames to hang on the walls. They hadn’t filled any of the frames with photos yet, but still. The promise of one day hung on her lips plenty enough. One of the frames was held up with chewed gum, gross but innovative for them—broker than broke—he wished he took more of his money when they first left Japan, but it wasn’t like he had that much in the first place. Even now, that mindset still applied. But they weren’t in debt. No mobsters, no yakuza, no government funds—yet—they were playing pretend and skipping down the frost-covered sidewalk. He didn’t think they had the cash to spend it in a restaurant.
“Kinda figured we didn’t have the money,” He said after a little bit of useless, dumb blonde staring. “Not like I’m helpin’ with any of the bills, so. It’s fine if we just go back home.”
Home was quiet. Home was empty. Home didn’t feel like home, but they made it work, and Reze had been proud to show him when they first ran—tucked into a complex, their neighbors were noisy but no different than anyone else, ever—and it must have taken a lot of wiggling to get out from under an authority’s thumb, murders and tracking and deals and contracts. It must have been a lot of work to properly escape to a random corner of the Soviet Union, bringing a boy with her and defecting, smiling and kissing at his knuckles when he was half-asleep with a slick cough, laid on his back, stuck between the floor and the ceramic toilet bowl.
At least this particular street wasn’t crowded. Night was coming up. Some buildings had brightly lit windows, all yellow and orange in their faux warmth, and others were pitch black with giant closed-signs on the doors. He looked at the street lights, too, and some were on whereas others weren’t. It kinda felt like any other part of Japan that wasn’t doing too good. Winters didn’t seem as bad in his memories, though.
This place certainly felt… colder.
But maybe that was ‘cause Reze led him here and then they stopped talking about anything else.
“There’s enough money to eat,” Reze commented, more idle than anything. She didn’t even sound corrosive this time. “And if you helped with the bills, there would only be more things to pay.” She brushed her shoulder with his, very softly. “You get into too much trouble.”
Denji sighed—ragged—and scuffed his boot along the ice that solidified between two concrete slabs. The sidewalk might as well be a slip-‘n-slide. “Sorry,” he said, a bit flatly. “It’s not my intention, y’know.”
Reze made a sound similar to a laugh, and pulled her shoulder away. “I know.”
There were these random stretches of time where she acted less like a person who killed him, and more like the girl who snuck him into a school. No, that wasn’t right. These days, she didn’t act like either of those people.
Normal or not. It must be so tiring. Denji thought it was, and he didn’t even put in the same kind of work that Reze did.
(I don’t know why you look at me at all. I don’t know why we share a bed but never do anything. I don’t know why you feed me first. I don’t know why you took my hand. I don’t know why you’ve all but taken my heart.)
It was odd. This place was… odd.
Mostly because he didn’t understand a fucking lick of what anyone was saying, at all, and Reze had to do all the talking and translations and shit. She was clearly good at it—she knew the language—languages, in some cases!—but it still left a decent sized crater in Denji’s chest. He didn’t know anything about this place. It didn’t feel like home, but he agreed to run away with Reze, and so here he was. Home wasn’t a place meant to be this gloomy. It wasn’t that bad. He didn’t know. Denji never had big dreams—not even Pochita had convinced him to create a world that was made of bliss. He had wanted a girlfriend, to touch boobs, share a meal, enjoy some heating—and other things—but that felt so… small. It was total garbage, now.
“I was thinking pelmeni,” Reze said, rather than saying anything about Denji’s inability to provide.
Then again, it wasn’t like Chainsaw Man could provide anything in this situation, either. There was nowhere to go except forward. No other path to walk, or whatever. The idea of trying to find a way out from this dumbass situation felt as hopeless as living in a shed and accumulating more debt than you could pay off.
“That’s fine,” Denji said. “What kind of filling were ya thinkin’?”
“Oh, I’m not sure,” Reze replied. “Beef or pork are probably still available at this time of night… hmmm. I don’t think vareniki is any good. All we need to do is find a restaurant and poke our heads in!”
Denji watched her lips curl.
She was pretty. She had been the first girl interested in him. Miss Makima—didn’t count—really. He knew that, sort of. Even if he didn’t like to think about it for long. Reze had a nice smile. Her hair was nice, too. Her eyes gleamed in certain ways, and when they slept together on the mattress on the floor in their little apartment, the lack of proper heat wasn’t so bad. He would meet her gaze and only feel a little queasy. She might feel queasy too, or maybe—nothing—maybe she didn’t feel anything about it. Just another passing thought. Reze was cute, and smart, and had the means to do a lot. Denji wasn’t being a fiend or a Devil Hunter or anything special. Well, not really. (Long shot. Such a long, long, long shot.) Reze said he was special in his own way, but it was a bit backhanded. She smiled when she said it, always in the doorway of their bedroom, always shucking her shoes on or off.
Reze didn’t say it very often, but on the rare occasion they would sit on the floor and lean against the wall together—they didn’t have a couch yet, just some old chair cushions they used for support—she would wrap her hand around his wrist and feel his pulse and say I’m glad you’re my boyfriend and not my victim, and the words always came out wretched and bloody, even if she didn’t currently have the flu or some other random human sickness.
(I’m glad you’re my girlfriend, he would say, but mostly mean the bittersweet notion of I’m glad you didn’t take my chainsaw heart after all.)
“Denji?” Reze asked, like ripples.
The tide pulled him in, pushed him back on the grey sand.
Her mouth moved and yet her voice sounded as if they were underwater, still chained together as they kicked up sand at the bottom of the harbor. He blinked once and then saw her eyes looking right back at him.
Maybe she thought about the ocean and the beach, too. Maybe the chill of the water was nothing compared to the frigid climate of this part of the continent. The Soviet Union occupied territory that was, in Denji’s honest opinion, too fucking cold. It shouldn’t be possible to live around here at all. In his case, he should be dead. In Reze’s case, she should be an obedient puppet for the government. She should, also, have his hand in her palms and hand it over to whatever big shot originally asked for it. Denji didn’t know. It wasn’t like anyone actually agreed to Chainsaw Man and the Bomb Girl evacuating and going utterly, absolutely, undeniably rogue. By rogue, he meant quiet. Nothing was happening at all. They wiped themselves off the map. They tried. They were still trying to.
That was why they were in this tiny little city—town—place. Just them, together, alone. Denji didn’t talk much in public and didn’t go out during the day. Reze did all kinds of jobs and was good to the civilians without ever actually smiling or being overly polite, and Denji had no idea why or how. He didn’t know and didn’t bother to ask.
“Denji,” Reze said, and her mouth was moving the same way Denji was.
It—they—just kept going, going, going.
One day they would be gone, probably. The two of them—separate ways, or maybe not. Denji imagined it would happen sooner than later. The snow could kill him. Maybe there was a blizzard devil… or a devil for winter, maybe just bad weather in general. He didn’t know, really.
“Yeah?” He asked, and he stopped at the corner of the street and awkwardly shifted so his shoulder would block Reze’s path.
The crosswalk wasn’t lit up, yet, and there were a few cars going. She wasn’t clueless by any means, but he didn’t want her to, you know, get hit by a car. But—well, it could happen to either of them. He glanced at her a few times, not discreet at all. His face felt warm but his nose and ears and mouth felt like ice. For a moment, just a moment—with the way she looked at him in response—he thought she might shove him into the road. He thought, that’d suck, and didn’t brace for anything. Instead of a sudden death that wouldn’t actually be death, the girl he ran away with just smiled slightly, the barest curl of her mouth.
(Do you want to?)
Reze, rather naturally, stopped walking and instead leaned some of her body weight into his side. “If you don’t want pelmeni, or vareniki,” she said. “There are other things, you know. We could stop at a convenience store.”
(I think you should.)
“It’s fine,” Denji shrugged.
He expected to hear other things from her, not more menu options. Food was stood. He wasn’t particularly picky. She knew that already.
“I mean it,” Reze insisted, easily, and her tongue could twist in so many unexpected ways. “We could get something lighter on your stomach, if you’re worried about throwing up again.”
Her nose wrinkled as soon as she said it. They both had one thought going through their minds at the reminder: gross.
Because that was what it was: gross.
Denji threw up into frozen pipes all the time, and he got sick more often than he should, and Reze took care of him in little ways but still wore his jacket. He didn’t know what that was about, but he didn’t ever ask for it back, so. You know. It was his own fault.
(His fault, not hers. Denji didn’t know how he ended up with that conclusion.)
The sky was dark. It was night, almost, and it was stormy. He should say snowy but the snow had yet to fall.
Soon, he thought, soon.
(Close the goddamn door.)
“Nah,” and he shook his head, staring at the red sign that then shifted to a dreary green. “The—dumplings, right?” And she nodded at his question. He nodded his head, too, so much strain on his dumb human neck. “We can get ‘em,” he declared, “They’re fine, don’t worry, it’s whatever. Let’s go get ‘em.”
The green was barely there, but he saw it. The signal to walk, to keep going. No cars, either. Only a few other people off to the side, far and farther away. The snow piled up on the sidewalk and gutters and parts of the road, but not all of it. Never all of it. Don’t take up space that isn’t yours. His shoulders loosened, and his hand twitched. Without waiting for more, he reached over and grabbed Reze’s arm, looping his between her elbow. Her hand stayed in the coat pocket. She blinked fast, just once—an unnerving portrait of a girl covered in the pool; glimmering—the glint of metal and more—and Denji tugged her along and into the crosswalk without further ado.
“Denji,” said Reze, and she dug her hand out of her pocket and grabbed the boy’s hand instead, squeezing so tightly—she might as well just break him—break bones—but her face contorted, liquid smooth, and not a lot of people smiled here, but Reze denied this habit when she spoke to Denji, even if half the time her expression was akin to plastic. With teeth, she murmured quietly, “Thank you.”
(The words you’re welcome didn’t rest on his tongue at all. What a bad habit, a bad thing.)
They crossed the street easily, bustling, and Denji felt the air begin to turn his spine numb. He ignored it. Reze, uncharacteristically, leaned against him as they walked. He held her weight, even though it was unnecessary.
“Hah,” he breathed out, shallow and unconforming—he didn’t know any better these days, “Yeah, always. No problem.”
A few snowflakes touched his head.
Reze snickered at him, nearly silent, reaching up and brushing them off with their intertwined hands. It prickled.