#Chiro is too pure for this world

[incorrect-srmthfg-quotes]

Chiro: Why are people so obsessed with top or bottom? Honestly, I’d just be excited to have a bunk bed.

Nova: ...

Antauri: ...

Nova: I’m gonna tell him.

Antauri: Don’t you dare.

[submitted by @thelozking ]

[formless-monkeys]

I'm afraid to ask but what do you mean by "mangled by power primate"?

The post that sentence came form is speculation in its finest form.

Steeped deep into my own beliefs, biases, experiences. Oh yes. We’re about to get religious up in here.

To get straight to the point, (and because I accidentally deleted the first draft of this answer)…

The Verans are angels. But not angels in a purely Christian way, but in a way that takes a distinctly Hindu twist to it. Ascending beyond the mortal needs in a very jnana-marga way. 

The fact that there are initiates and trainees implies that you can become a Mystic. People can become angels and live to protect the universe. Isn’t that great?

Isn’t it?

Leaving behind everything you are, everything you were, everything you could’ve been on your next cycle to become something that can no longer experience the universe you are protecting? Not to me.

Angels are terrifying. Becoming one? I don’t trust it. It’s not up to me to decide what is good and bad, and I’m sure the Verans have different priorities than me, but I can’t help but fear them. What they’ve become.

The concept of purity doesn’t exist in my mind. I don’t think it ever has. That’s a result of never having the luxury of being 100% anything.

There is no pure force of good, only a force that is overall more beneficial.

There is no pure evil, only a force that takes more than it gives.

Chiro, as cute and incorruptible as he is, has a body count.

And Skeleton King still has the remnants of a good man undulating within his horrible body.

People suffer in the pursuit of good.

People find purpose and fulfillment in the pursuit of bad.

But that’s my point. The Power Primate and The Dark Ones could be perfectly good and perfectly bad on their own, but they’re being channeled through people. Imperfection is a given. 

Channeling the Dark Ones through a person leads to a horrifying leader of the dead. The destroyer of worlds. The Skeleton King…

Who self sabotages… out of pride? or is it because deep down he still cares?

Chiro’s at his closest to the Power Primate when he’s in a state of grief and aggression. 

But back to the angels.

This face is more than anyone can animate, more than we can comprehend… and it’s not because of Skeleton King, no… Skeleton King doesn’t create monsters beyond our comprehension, for he is still a man himself. He changed an angel, sure, but not into a demon.

This is not the face of a demon, created for destruction. This is the face of a man. A man who spent years of his life dedicated to divine power. Who became something more than a man. This is still the face of an angel.

An angel, in all its glory and power… is still corruptible.

That is why it’s so terrifying to me. That’s why I used mangled. In a similar fashion to The Enigma of Amigara Fault, it strikes a deep fear within me from a distrust of “perfection”. Of purity as well. I can’t accept Ciro’s word that Antauri ascended beyond the need for worldly desires because that makes him too close to ‘perfection’ for me to trust him. I can’t accept a lot of things

because some things are ‘purely’ good or evil.

[katapunberbicara]

Ailurophile’s diary : What it feels when raising kittens

I have two kittens which are around four months in house, and since their coming into the world it feels like everyday is a blessings. I know each of their appearances, their characters, and what differentiates them each other in detail. However, back before, there were four kittens in my house, named Hime, Kimi, Pablo, and Chiro. It was all started when I first came at home and found out that my Hwiroh had died after suffering with pain for more than one week. That was really a heartbreaking moment because all the places he was used to sleep reminded me of him, but, the only thing I found was only emptyness since he wasn’t there lying anymore. Soon after that, we (me + my siblings) had new kittens, and the best part was they seemed to be Hwiroh’s biological children, especially Chiro who had the same look with Hwiroh. No doubt we become fall in love with these creatures. Without their presence, I might have been drowned in sorrow longer than that.

To see those kittens ran over in house was really overwhelmed things. Pablo was the quietest but the cutest with his black and white colour. And do not be fooled with Hime’s appearance, she might be looking so weak and therefore was bullied, but there laid hidden strengths burried in her smallest body. Kimi was the biggest and the one who liked to bully Hime, she was the type of Calico cat with three colours on her body. And the last was Chiro who was the most similiar with Hwiroh. He had a love pattern on his body and liked to explore new places. Day by day, they became bigger, more active, and it meant that we had to let them out of the door. Then, it had been determined in one morning, so I and mom prepared their house as comfortable as possible. They would like their new house said my mom for several times to convince me. And in the afternoon, something terrible happened which broke me in tears. Since then, only two kittens left. This incident made me become more possesive towards them. I would never let those small creatures outside the house ever. The world outside the house is terrifying, there waits many scary things that would endanger their lives.

Despite many excitements, but comes along the responsibility to take care of them as the consequence of letting them inside. Every morning and afternoon, I and my sister clean up their toilet. But, the last incident has influenced these kittens behavior. Kimi is easy to be fear of the loneliness. Everytime she finds no one around, she would make a ‘sad mew’ which sounds like a cry in my ears. She may be traumatized due to the self-witnessesing the death of her siblings in the eyes. On one hand, Chiro is so much different. He is so active to go around alone, likeable, and easy to play with hoomans that might be probably because he had ran away when the incident and thus hadn’t witnessed what happened after that.

As they grow older, their moms was being lazy to nurse them which indicated that the kitten should be weaned from the mother and eating kitten food solely. In order to keep them healthy, we cooked them kind of porridge made from dry food which was added with warm water to make it softer, and sometimes we gave them wet food with egg. However, as the one who was heavily addicted to milks a lot, Kimi was kinda shock with such transition then refused to eat. She only wanted to drink her mom’s milk so bad. It was quite frustrating for me as seeing how her weight lost drastically due to her refusement. Thus, she was suffered with pain. In day one, she suddenly walked with a limp but still wanted to eat though she had lost her appetite. Day two, she only wanted to sleep over during the days and nights, and even refused to drink. Day three, I had prepared to take her to the veterinarian but fortunately she got better as she could eat well, though she was too weak to have other activities besides sleeping.

During her long illness, I and my siblings had given her favourite food and dripped water through the pipette to her mouth. I covered her with towel in order to keep hers warm. Everytime she looked wanted to take a pee, I took her to the box immediately since she limped heavily as she moved. I liked to pat her body while she was sleeping so she would feel comfortable. Those were all said from the articles I found on the internet which was telling how to nurse a sick cat. Because Kimi had been sick, Chiro lost his enthusiasm in playing and only slept over the time beside her. Luckily, soon after that, Kimi got better and could play along with Chiro again.

From this experience, it is true that after the storm there will be a rainbow. Kimi who was at first very closed and hard to be approached then changed to be the most adorable and attractive cat ever. She likes to play with me. Everytime I call her, she would answer by saying ‘mew’ nicely then walk towards me and shake her tail as the sign that she is happy. She likes to sit in my feet till fall asleep. Sometimes she would show her belly and I would automatically pet her gently. Having been experienced the illness made her got all attention, comfort, love, and kindness. May be she then realised that she just love being pampered. And as for me, after all the terrible mess happened, the most relieving thing is seeing that she is being happy, so a happy Kimi is a happy me! And a happy Chiro is a happy me! Nothing would change my mind.

So, how did it feel to raise kittens?

The experience of raising two kittens, many or less, has given me several pictures about how to raise my own child. All the emotions such happiness comes simply as seeing them happy, healthy, and enjoy their meals. It is said that in a article a healthy cat is an eater. Then we provide them fish oil so that they like eating. I may be kinda traumatized with the cat refusing her food, thus her immune was slowing down rapidly therefore she was easy to be suffered with pain. On one hand, there also comes worry as seeing them suffered with the pain and many other emotions coming one another as the time being. That was once ever happened in one day, it seemed to me that their fur was infected with fungus, then I was googling and found out that a mixture of turmeric and olive oil will cure the infection. And then, I made it.

And all the responsibility which suddenly comes and many things that are still needed to be learned more. Also, I get the feeling of possesion towards them. And, because of that, sometimes I might refuse other’s advice over them cause I may think that I know them better than anybody else. From nursing them, I get to know that every kittens as well as human being is not typically the same. We require to observe them at first, and then treat them differently based on their unique characters. If it sounds ridiculous for you, it’s okay, but I have been living with those kittens 24 hours on 7 days and self-witnessing how’s they have gotten a bigger size day by day. But their circle of life runs faster than us, like now they come at the phase at the peack of activeness in age 3 months or probably around 2 or 3 years in our age. At this phase, they like exploring anything, experiencing many new things, and playing over the house, making my mom dizzy to see what’s left after they make a mess of things. But that is a very normal things at their age, right?

So here’s a little note to you. You become responsible with what you have tamed. Though at the first, kittens would look the same in your eyes, but soon after you would find that yours always unique. Because, it is the time you had shared with them made them unique in all the world. Unlike us, cat is the animal that has honesty and pure heart. If you share love with them, they would pay exactly the same. And if you treat them badly, they would pay you the same way either.

NB.

First of all, this post actually has been postponed for months. And surely, many things have changed since then, but, still, I want to keep writing this so bad. Since I found writing is the least thing I could do to recall the sweet past memories with someone or something I love which wouldn’t be repeated.  As for me, one of the those things that wouldn’t be ever repeated again in the tomorrow or in the other days in the future is the time spent with Kimi. My lovely Imi who left us three days ago because of severe pain she had endured for three days. This is so sad that I know about this truth at the very late moment so there is nothing I can do to help her from afar. However, it seemed that, God loves her more than us do so He didn’t want her suffered that pain longer than this.

Imi, if I were able on your side during your time, I wished I could take care of you. Patted your body gently. Played along with you like the last time we did. But sadly, neither of us could do those sweet things again in the future. We are now separated by the time, right?

I remember again, the last day we met before I got caught by the flight, suddenly you came and then had a seat on my feet as if it was your last, so you didn’t want me to go. And even I don’t ever think that was really our last. Seeing you acted like that, made me harder to leave you in house. Since that day, I like to count the days left until I can go home again to meet my family, included my kittens who has grown bigger since then and waited me in house. But, now only Chiro waiting for me. May be that is why we should value every lives and times that has been granted for us.

…And this post is a tribute for my lovely Imi, who was so adorable and whom I owed the meaning of caring is everything. Enin will always miss you so so, Imi. Especially when you said ‘MAU! MAU!’ loudly which resembles in our language as to tell that you want something. But, you got to know this one word from nowhere, and you always said this word only in one condition, whenever you felt hungry. You were also so spoiled making me hard to leave you and always wanted to protect you. But I’m so glad knowing that you would never feel the fear of loneliness anymore. Because now you are placed to the where you used to belong and thus gathered with Hime, Pablo, and Hwiroh. Enin really hope that you would like your new home, Imi.

Bandung, 3rd November 2019 | ©Hairatunnisa

[carnistcervine]

Twin Avatars AU

Randomish AU idea I’ve been thinking about for a while. Then this morning I just figured, fuck it, wynaut? ;D

~x~

*Instead of one Avatar, there's two. And the Avatar Spirit is a set of twin spirits.

*A light spirit named Chiaro, and a dark spirit named Scuro. The Light Avatar has Chiaro and the Dark Avatar has Scuro.

*Yes, their names are based on Chiaroscuro. It refers to the contrast of light and dark values, so I thought it would be fitting. c: Plus it's like my favorite painting style/technique!

*No, Chiaro and Scuro are not like Raava and Vaatu where one is good and one is evil. The dark and light spirit's dynamic is more like this: Chiaro is extremely stubborn, but level headed and clear minded, and Scuro is mad, but open-minded and a creative thinker. The best comparison I can think of off the top of my head is Chiaro is more like Pakku, and Scuro is more like Bumi.

*The cycle of the Light Avatar is the traditional water, earth, fire, air. The cycle for the Dark Avatar runs in reverse, air, fire, earth, water.

*The two avatars can always recognize the current or previous incarnations of the other.

*Also, seeing as Chiaro and Scuro are twins, the Light and Dark Avatars are basically platonic soul-mates. Their friendship has transcended thousands of lifetimes. It goes back all the way to the first two Avatars, Wan and Chiro. (I consider LoK and ATLA to be different canons, but Wan is cute so he can stay.)

*Aang is the Light Avatar, and Yume(OC doughnut steel) is the Dark Avatar.

*Aang is a twelve year old airbender and Yume is a sixteen year old firebender.

*While Aang was born to pure-blooded airbenders, Yume is a half-breed who was born in the Northern Water Tribe.

*In fact, she was recognized as the Dark Avatar when she wandered up to Light Avatar Roku as a two year old. She had gotten separated from her Mom, and recognized him. He recognized her as the re-incarnation of Mina(the previous airbending Dark Avatar) immediately. Side note: Now I wanna draw Roku playing with tiny Yume. So cute! <3

*Funny thing about the twin spirits, Chiaro re-incarnates as pure-blooded benders, and usually into families of note. While Scuro tends to re-incarnate into unexpected places and into half-breed bodies. It's completely like Scuro to re-incarnate as a swampbender, or a half-breed, or even pureblooded bender born into a non-native nation.

*Scuro is just tricky like that.

*Naturally, after Roku passes, Yume and Aang eventually meet and become fast friends. Neither realize that the other is an avatar at the time, but feel a strange connection.

*Much how like Aang has Appa, and Roku had Fang, Yume has a dragon named Draco. Yume met Draco when he was still an egg, and he and Aang are two of the only friends that Yume had.

*When Yume turns five, she starts to show serious firebending talent and is sent to the Fire Nation to master firebending. She ends up living with the Fire Sages(who take her in as they sense doom looming in the horizon and wish to protect the young avatar.) The Fire Sages do not tell her she is the Avatar until her sixteenth birthday.

*The sages fears are realized when Yume is spirited away soon after turning sixteen.

*When Aang froze himself, the spirits dragged Yume into the void between the spirit and mortal realm. Mercifully, they drag Draco into the void too.

*In the void, the previous Dark Avatars taught Yume the other elements and helped her become a fully realized Dark Avatar.

Side note- I actually can’t decide between Yume being a fully realized avatar, and being an ava-noob like Aang. Because I could have her with Aang bumbling around, learning how to properly utilize an ancient, powerful spirit and being adorable as two besties learn the elements together. Or I can have her contrast with Aang who is untrained but more emotionally stable. And also, she would absolutely feel completely responsible for him and feel like a complete failure when a certain terrible thing happens.

*In the void, time does not exist, so Yume doesn't age. Physically or mentally. No, she just becomes lonelier and more eccentric.

*When Aang breaks out of the iceberg, Yume is released from the void. Resulting in Yume and Draco crashing right into a sleeping Appa.

*Appa's a little salty about having his nap disturbed but is happy to see Draco.

*Yume is extatic to see Aang, and Aang is also quite excited to see Yume.

*It's only in that moment that Aang and Yume realize that the other is an avatar.

*Even though Yume knows that Aang is the Light Avatar, she doesn't reveal his secret. She opts to let him come clean on his own terms.

*At first Katara and Sokka(mostly Sokka) are suspicious of Yume. Seeing as she's wearing Fire Nation clothes(and is technically half-Fire). However they don't know that she's a half-breed and assume she's just Fire Nation.

*Yume is surprised by the amount of hostility she gets over being Fire Nation.

*"Look, I know there's something off about Sozin, but we're not all like that." "...What do you mean he died decades ago??"

*Both Aang and Yume have a hard time wrapping their heads around the fact that a century had passed.

*Katara is quicker to warm up to Yume, because she doesn't act like the fire-bugs that raided her village. Yume's actually quite nice, if a little strange. Also, she's the Dark Avatar, a force a balance and bringer of hope to the world.

*Despite Yume's strangeness, Sokka can't help but warm up to her as well.

*Both Aang and Yume convince Katara to go into the abandoned Fire Nation ship, and trigger boobie traps. Yume takes full responsibility(even though it was Aang's idea), and is kicked out. Aang decides to go with her, because he feels bad about getting her kicked out.

*While away, Aang and Yume have a heart to heart about why Aang lied about being the Avatar.

*When Zuko comes, both Aang and Yume come to the villages rescue. When they ask why she came back, Yume just says that it's her duty to protect the innocent.

*Because Yume is technically 116, she uses outdated Fire Nation slang. It pisses Zuko off to no end, and she enjoys every second of it. In fact, when she first sees him, she greets him with "Flameo, hotman!" and he gets really fuckin mad. :'D

*Zuko is about to take on a fully realized Avatar, and Yume thinks that so adorable. The difference in power between the two is so great, that Yume can hardly take him seriously.

*Even though Yume knows she can take this pissy Prince and his little squad, she doesn't argue when Aang opts to surrender.

*Of course she and Aang escape easily.

*The first time Yume sees Aang go into the avatar state, she freezes up. Something in her twists painfully at the sight of him in such distress.

*Even though Yume is a fully realized Avatar, she cannot defeat the Fire Lord alone. She needs Aang. And Aang is still untrained.

*Yume is horrified and disgusted by what the Fire Nation has become. And despite being the Dark Avatar, is often given the side-eye by the very people she and the rest of the Gaang try to help.

*Yume helps supplement Aang's training, but even she realizes that he needs to learn from real masters.

*When shit goes down at Wan Shi Tong's library, both Appa and Draco are stolen. Yume is completely devastated, but pretends like it isn't affecting her.

*She drinks cactus juice along with Sokka! :'D Although, she actually knew what it would do to her.

*Even though Yume puts on a brave front, Katara can sense just how much loosing Draco is hurting her. But unlike Aang, Yume refuses to open up and show her true feelings.

*At least until Draco comes back and she sobs into his fluffy dragon mane.

*When Aang gets shot down in Ba Sing Se, it wasn't just Yume watching her childhood friend die. It was thousands of lifetimes watching their platonic soul-mate die right in front of them, it was Scuro watching their twin perish right before their eyes.

*Yume was consumed by a blinding, inescapable rage. For the first time, a fully realized Avatar completely lost control. Yume completely leveled Ba Sing Se before Draco was able to calm her down. She only barely escaped.

*In that night, the world lost both it's Avatars once again.

*Aang felt like he failed the world, and Yume was too afraid of loosing control again.

*When the time came to face Ozai on the day of the comet, Aang went to the lion-turtle alone. Yume doesn't know where he went and is afraid that she'll have to face Ozai alone. That she'll lose control again.

*She goes with Sokka, Suki, and Toph to stop the warships and face Ozai.

*When she and Aang face off against the Fire Lord, she holds back and is shot down. When she comes too, she sees what she thinks is Ozai finishing off Aang(when his fire breaks through Aang's protective earth sphere and he slams against that rock). And immediately goes full on avatar state, but Aang is fine, and now also in the avatar state.

*The two of them completely curbstomp Ozai.

*Yume is about to deliver the final blow, when Aang comes out of the avatar state and stops her. She yields, and restrains Ozai instead. Aang then does his thing and takes Ozai's bending away.

*When the war is over, and it's time to have meetings to make peace, Yume is a terrible diplomat.

*She keeps putting her feet up on the table, pretending to fall asleep during meetings(while making an obnoxious snoring sound), and is actively hostile towards most of the old, stubborn generals and government officials that refuse to make the diplomacy process easy.

*There is even one incident where one Earth Kingdom general is giving Fire Lord Zuko shit about not just letting him kick people out of the Fire Nation colonies. Zuko argues that it's not fair to just kick people out of the only home they've known and make them homeless. The general isn't empathetic. Yume is visibly annoyed, and openly glaring at the man.

*"Is there something you have to say to me, Avatar?"

*"Yeah. You're a bitch."

*Zuko is horrified, Toph is laughing. Aang is struggling to remain composed.

*"Excuse me??"

*"Oh, I'm sorry. Let me rephrase that. You're a cunt."

*"I don't have to take this. If you do not expel your people from my land, there will be consequences."

*"Are you trying to start another war?"

*"I'll do what I have to."

*"You better not, I know where you live."

*The room goes silent.

*"Are you threatening me?"

*"It's not a threat, it's a promise~" ;)

[whoneedsapublisher]

Nico’s Magic

And finally, the week of fics for Studio Coattail’s patreon launch comes to an end. I hope you’ve all enjoyed it. For our last one, we have a special treat: the most pornographic thing I’ve ever posted. I’ve been sitting on this for ages because I wasn’t sure if I actually wanted to post it, but here it is. NozoNico, and technically a sequel to Happy Maid Day by Chiro, but you don’t need to have read that to understand it. 

Words: ~4000

Summary: Hello! It's me, Nico Yazawa, and I have a juicy secret to tell all of my fans.

Also on Ao3

Hello, hello, adoring fans! It’s me, Nico Yazawa, the universe’s number one super idol, known by every idol fan from Earth to… um… Saturn? Saturn’s a planet, right? Anyway! The great Nico is a famous and talented idol, beloved by all! Her skill as an idol, and frankly sinful cuteness, made her a household name ever since high school. Okay, so there were minor setbacks early in her career. Every good star has a tale of adversity, right? Once μ’s happened, it was all fine! Well, until μ’s ended, and there was little bit of a slump, and- look, not important! I made it to the big time, that’s what matters!

Buuuut being adorable and gifted and fashionable isn’t the whole Nico story, of course! There’s other things to an idol! And… alright, fine. Look. This isn’t really an idol thing, okay? In fact, it’s something I worked damn hard to keep under wraps as an idol, because it’s the sort of thing that would have the same effect on an idol career as a pack of fireworks on a house of cards.

I kinda have… magic. No, not the magic to make anyone smile! That’s just 100% all natural Nico Nico charm! No talismans, hexes, or spells involved! With a face as cute and a smile as radiant as Nico’s, you don’t need magic to make the world smile with you!

No, it’s something entirely unrelated. Really, it’s pretty underwhelming. Disappointing, even. When you hear “magic” you think like, making things float, or throwing fireballs around, or making things disappear, right? Well, I kind of have that last thing. The problem is, it only works on clothes.

And only if I’m wearing them.

Yeah. Not exactly superhero stuff, is it? You can see why I don’t exactly go spreading it around.

I first found out about it by accident. Through, uh, a certain chain of unfortunate events, I ended up… um… acting as a maid for a friend. It’s a long story, okay! Way too long to explain now, just forget it, it’s not important! Anyway, while Nico Ni was pure innocent maiden, Nozomi has always been a pervert, and so my mind… may have wandered to what kind of weird stuff she might make me do. And, I maybe kiiiiinda had a crush on her, so I was sorta fantasizing a little… Honestly, though, who wouldn’t assume that she had perverted intentions?! She made me dress up as a maid for her, and even had special lingerie! Which was the perfect size! Who even knows their friends’ underwear size?!

Anyway, I was standing there, watching Nozomi eat the delicious meal I made for her (and trust me, it was super delicious, I’m sure it blew her mind) and thinking about what she was going to make me do next and then… it happened.

It was sort of like… an involuntary twitch. Like when your hand moves without you meaning it to. Except instead of my hand, it was whatever controls my power. All of a sudden, a part of me I never knew I had before moved, and I was suddenly in my underwear.

Nozomi seemed… remarkably undisturbed about it, honestly. Maybe she thought I’d just stripped and hidden the outfit when she was distracted with her food? Really, that should have gotten a little more reaction out of her as well, jeez… I mean, her super cute idol friend, as far as she thought, had randomly stripped to pose in her underwear in front of her? Shouldn’t she be like, super grateful at getting to see something so amazing? Also, annoyingly, she had a second identical outfit for me, so it didn’t even get me out of playing a maid! But by the time I left (not without further humiliation, I might add) it seemed like she’d completely forgotten that I’d suddenly lost my clothes at one point.

I didn’t, though.

At first, I thought Nozomi was behind it. After all, she barely seemed surprised when it happened, which was pretty damn suspicious. She was always going on about having spiritual powers, after all. Who was to say that they didn’t include stripping innocent girls she’d lured into her lair?

Eventually, though, I noticed it. A feeling of… holding something. Not in my hands, obviously. They were clearly empty. But there was this… look, “feeling” is the only word for it, okay? Jeez, you try explaining the sensation of holding something with your hands to a snake or something! It’s just something you know! You can feel it!

After a while, it started to bug me, so I tried to… drop it? I guess? Whatever the action was, that weird sensation of something that was part of me but not there moving happened again, and suddenly I was wearing that stupid maid outfit again, over my pyjamas.

So obviously there was some more experimenting, and then a whole thing of trying to smuggle the maid outfit back into Nozomi’s house, but in the end, I had this new power that I’d figured out how to use.

So… remember how the first time it happened, I ended up mostly naked in front of the girl I liked, standing in the middle of her living room?

Um. It turns out, I… kinda liked it.

Of course, it wasn’t like I could do anything about it. I was an idol after all. Scandal is poison to an idol, and exhi-… and being naked in front of people is a really easy way to generate it. So I didn’t really use my power for a few years. Oh, I mean, I used it here and there, to change outfits really quickly or something, but nothing big.

Sometimes when I was on stage, though, the temptation would hit me.

What if I used it right then? What if, just for a second, I made all my clothes disappear, with a million people’s eyes on me?

It was just a fantasy, obviously. At an idol concert, someone is always taking a picture, or video, or both. If I was naked for even a fraction of a second, it would be plastered over every gossip website before the concert even ended. My career would be dead right there, and killing the wonderful Nico Ni’s career would be a crime against all of humanity. But it was an intoxicating fantasy. The idea of all those eyes on me suddenly seeing everything, of so many people seeing me like that. And even before I stopped being an idol I started to… indulge a little.

It started small. Sometimes, when I was travelling between places, or waiting around somewhere, I’d make my underwear vanish. No one could tell, of course, but under my skirt, for a minute or two, my panties would be gone, or my bra would vanish out from under my blouse. There wasn’t even any risk, I rationalised to myself. If an unexpected breeze or something came along, I could re-appear them instantly, before anything happened. Then I started to make myself totally naked in bathroom stalls, and eventually even changing rooms. Just for a moment! When I was sure no one was watching! But it still gave me a thrill. Just imagining how people didn’t even know how close they were to seeing cutesy innocent pop star Nico, baring her body to the world for anyone to see.

Not long before I retired, I started getting really dangerous. I’d go down to the convenience store late at night, bundled up in a trenchcoat and hat and glasses and everything, and I’d vanish everything underneath it. It gave me a huge thrill to buy something from a bored looking clerk, knowing that only my jacket was stopping him from seeing me totally naked. Luckily, nothing ever went too wrong, but there were a couple heart-stopping moments where I had to quickly reappear my clothes when my coat got caught on something or someone bumped into me. It was a dumb risk, but I just couldn’t resist it. After one of those sessions, I’d rush home to touch myself, and the orgasms I had then were more powerful than anything I’d ever experienced before.

I suppose it only made sense that I couldn’t hide it forever. The one who found out first was obvious too.

Nozomi caught me vanishing my underwear once. I don’t really know how- I suspect she was just staring at my boobs so intently that she noticed my bra vanish. I mean, really, who could blame her? I am pretty hot.

“Nico, are you not wearing a bra?” she asked.

“Uh, what? Of course I am,” I said, bringing it back hurriedly.

Nozomi narrowed her eyes. “You are now,” she said. “But you weren’t a second ago. How did you do that?” Suddenly, she gasped. “Is this something to do with that time you vanished that maid outfit back in high school?”

She still remembered it, after all that time. Geez, that woman’s poker face is just too good. She barely reacted to it in the moment but it stuck in her head for years?

For a moment, I almost lied to her. It would be easy, after all. Convincing someone you don’t have magic powers? Reality’s already done 99% of the work for you.

But then she said something that I couldn’t ignore. Apparently, my power wasn’t the only thing she’d figured out. She’d also figured out that there was only one reason why I’d do something like that with it.

“You know, Nico,” she said, right as I opened my mouth to deny her claim. “I’m watching you right now. Very closely.”

I swallowed nervously. “S-So what?”

“So,” she said, leaning forward and capturing my eyes with hers, her gaze so intense I couldn’t look away. “I wonder if there’s anything you want me to see?”

So, you know how I said I had a crush on her back in high school? That, uh, hadn’t entirely faded. Frankly, I don’t think I even made the conscious decision to use my power. My brain was so overloaded from the situation that my libido took over, and just like that, I was standing naked in front of Nozomi’s couch, everything exposed to her searching gaze.

There’s really not that many ways you can react to something like that. Either you get freaked out and kick a beautiful, stunning, maybe-not-that-innocent ex-idol out on the street and delete her number because you don’t know how valuable what you just found was, orrrr you make the right choice and snap her up before someone else does. And Nozomi definitely snapped me up.

I guess we skipped a few steps, really. We weren’t even going out when I stood up from the couch, but as soon as I used my power, Nozomi went for it in no uncertain terms.

“Oh my,” she said, her gaze sweeping over me and making me so wet that I was probably dripping on her rug. “That’s quite something to see, isn’t it?”

“I’m glad you appreciate it,” I said smugly, putting my hands on my hips. My heart beat a little faster at the utterly brazen pose I was taking. “Not just anyone gets to see this much of the famous Nico Yazawa, you know?”

“No, I suppose not,” Nozomi said. “They’re certainly missing out.”

Nozomi shifted forward, resting her chin on her hand and meeting Nico’s eyes again. “You should probably deal with your situation down there, Niccochi.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Isn’t it obvious?” Nozomi said, smiling calmly. “You’re dripping wet. Isn’t there something you usually do when that happens?”

My heart beat so hard that I swear Nozomi must have been able to hear it. My head spun. Poor little Nico Ni was so overwhelmed by how fast this was all happening, she never even thought about protesting. Instead, I slid my hand down my body and brushed against my pussy with a finger, letting out a strangled little moan as I did.

Nozomi just watched patiently as I started to rub little circles around myself, my other hand sliding up to grasp my breast. Nozomi’s eyes weren’t on mine anymore, as she openly stared at my pussy, but I couldn’t look away from hers. Watching those eyes, staring at me with such intensity, I felt like I was on fire, and I started to touch myself faster and rougher, desperate to satisfy the desire that she was stoking in me.

It was probably barely a minute before it was all too much for me. It was the first time I came in front of Nozomi, but it was far from the last.

To call Nozomi an enabler would be like saying a can of gasoline “enables” a campfire. With her help, and more importantly, at her insistence, I’ve started doing things that I wouldn’t have even dreamed of before.

We’ll go to movies and sit at the back corner, and as soon as the lights went down, Nozomi will tell me to vanish my clothes, and slowly play with me as the movie goes on. Sometimes she won’t even touch me at first, one time waiting almost an hour, letting me get distracted by the movie before she slid her hands between my legs and wiped it from my mind completely. Other times, she’ll bring me almost over the edge and then stop abruptly, letting me simmer in my frustration as she cheerfully watches whatever’s playing and I squirm in my seat, only to finally give me release after the movie ends, pulling me into the bathroom and sitting me down in a stall, then eating me out as I clamp my hands over my mouth to stop myself from being heard.

Other times, we’ll be in the middle of a crowd, and Nozomi will suddenly hug me close, enveloping me in her jacket, and tell me to vanish my clothes, leaving me only hidden by Nozomi’s coat, always waiting until just before I panic before she lets me bring my clothes back. We’ll go to packed festivals, and she’ll pull me away into an alley only feet away from the crowds and shove me face first against the wall, her hand over my mouth and her fingers inside me, whispering into my ear what a girl good I am as she roughly fucks me.

Of course, we don’t always do it outside. Nico Ni is a generous lover, of course. It’s not just about my pleasure. I like to make Nozomi feel good too, you know? She may love indulging my exhibitionism, but she has no desire to do it herself. Besides, she doesn’t have my power. If she got caught, she’d have no way to get out of the situation.

So we do it at home, too. Of course, Nozomi doesn’t always go for vanilla sex there, either. She loves making me strip for her, making me masturbate in front of her, and, well… look, once you have stuff like that, of course she’s going to start getting into being a dom, and making me “service” her. Nico isn’t so ungrateful that she’s going to complain about being ordered to eat out her girlfriend and having her hair pulled a little when she’s that girlfriend’s hard work and creativity is giving her the best orgasms of her life, right?

But my favourite time was when she let me live out my biggest fantasy.

Nozomi seems to have an endless web of people that she knows in one way or another, through some vague connection that I wouldn’t have even thought of. Somehow, through one of these people, she managed to find out about a sort of… theatre, or a concert hall sort of place, that was being closed down. The building was already sold, of course, but they were planning to tear everything down and build an apartment building there, so the security system had already been gutted and scrapped for parts. On the night before it was going to be demolished, we snuck inside.

Now of course, Nico Ni is eighteen forever, buuut, well, as the years go on she starts being… a little more eighteen, and not all of her old idol outfits still fit, exactly. But one or two do. And I had one of those with me that night, hidden in… wherever clothes go when I vanish them.

Nozomi had a little bag with her. Once we got backstage, I switched my clothes to the idol outfit, and Nozomi reached into her bag and pulled out two things I wasn’t expecting. The first was a pair of headphones.

The second was a blindfold.

It wasn’t a normal black strip of cloth, either. It was a mask, with fake eyes on it, so that when I was wearing it, it would look from a distance like I could see through it, but would actually completely block my vision.

I looked at her, confused, but she just smiled. “Put them on, Nico,” she said, and, well, she was kinda using her sexy voice, and usually when she uses that voice I just kinda… do what she says.

Obviously, with a blindfold on I couldn’t see anything, but to my surprise, the headphones blocked sound quite well.

Suddenly, I heard Nozomi’s voice in my ears. The directional audio on the headphones must have been good, because it sounded like she was right next to me, whispering into my ear. “Your public awaits, miss idol.”

I felt her grab my hand, and let myself be dragged out onto what must be the stage. She grabbed me by the shoulder and turned me to the left. To face the audience of course. Carefully, she lead me forward until I ran into a curtain, then turned me around and walked me to the wall. Showing me where the edges were. Then she moved me to the center of the stage again and let go.

“Okay, Nico,” came her voice in the headphones again. “Get ready to perform. You’re on in 3… 2… 1…”

Suddenly, music blared through the headphones, accompanied by the sound of a curtain sliding open and  a sudden cheer. It wasn’t just any music, either. It was one of my songs.

It had been years since I performed, but, well, Nico Ni is an idol to the bone. It wasn’t like I’d ever forget how. I slid into my routine like it was completely natural. The crowd cheered, the music blared, and it was like I was sent back in time, performing in a relatively small theatre, but to devoted and thrilled fans, a packed house roaring and singing along. I almost forgot where and when I was, sinking into my routine and focusing on getting the next step right, even though I couldn’t see my feet. Then, right at the climax of the song, I heard Nozomi’s voice in my ears again.

“Now, take off your clothes.”

At this point, I didn’t even think about it when she said that. Instantly, I vanished my outfit.

Suddenly, the cheers in my headphones turned into gasps. I froze up. With the blindfold and the headphones, I couldn’t see anything, and I could only hear what Nozomi let me hear. Ultimately… I had no idea if we were really alone in the theatre. For all I knew, Nozomi had secretly set up a special concert, and was just playing the noises around me into the headphones. The crowd murmured, confused. I could feel their eyes on me. I could practically see the shock on their faces.

“And 3… 2….” Nozomi was whispering to me again, and the music started back up. I felt back into my routine, but it now it was different. The crowd was cheering again, but there was an edge to it now, whoops and jeers. Every step felt different as my naked body waved and moved. Then, suddenly, Nozomi slipped her arms around me and slapped rotors on to my nipples, taping them in place with one deft motion.

I faltered.

“Keep dancing, Nico,” Nozomi said, her force harsh and urgent. “Do. Not. Stop.”

I kept dancing, automatically, like a puppet on her strings. Nozomi turned on the rotors, and I whimpered, my steps getting shaky. The crowd roared, their cheering and hollering accelerating. This… this was real. I’d been tricked. I was really naked, in front of a huge crowd of fans.

I was shaking now, barely able to keep up my steps. The end of this song was mostly swaying in place and hand gestures, and I felt Nozomi press herself against my back, and her strapon slipped inside me. It wasn’t hard. I was so wet that I’d almost slipped on my own juices. The cheering got louder as she began to thrust as I helplessly kept dancing, my legs barely holding up. They were all watching. All of their eyes were burning into me, and they were all watching me get fucked like a slut while I performed. Everyone was watching. A million eyes were watching, oh god, the song was almost over, everyone was watching and I couldn’t hold back any more, they were all going to see me cum-

Nozomi’s hand came from nowhere and firmly stimulated my clit just as the song ended, and with a giant audience looking on in glee, I came harder than I’ve ever cum before, and all my senses fizzled out.

When I could think again, I was lying on the floor in Nozomi’s lap, the rotors gone. Shakily, I pushed up the blindfold.

The curtain was still closed. The theatre was still dark. When I pulled off one ear of the headphones, I was met with silence broken only by Nozomi’s soft humming as she stroked my hair, bringing me down to earth again.

“Well, Niccochi?” she said. “Did you enjoy your idol flashing play?”

I glanced over and saw her laptop sitting by us. There was some kind of audio mixing software open. “You… set all that up?”

Nozomi smiled. “Well, I may have had some help with some of the sound design. I’m afraid my helper thought it was for editing an old video of your performances, though. Wouldn’t he be shocked to know the real reason?”

I just gaped at her.

I don’t know how she figured me out. I know it wasn’t just that one occurrence where she caught me disappearing my bra. Nozomi’s smart, and cautious. She wouldn’t have made an accusation like that if she didn’t know for sure, and she wouldn’t have remembered something from all the way back in highschool at a second’s notice. She must have pieced it together before, sometime earlier, and waited for a chance to strike. However she did it, she saw through me, and that’s how we ended up lovers.

And I couldn’t be happier about it. The great Nico Ni wouldn’t settle for just anyone, but as I shakily sat up to kiss my wonderful girlfriend as I came down from the high of living out my ultimate fantasy, I was confident that I’d actually managed to find the one girl worthy of having Nico all to herself.

Of course, even after living out the best, we’re still trying new things. That’s why I’m writing this, without changing any names. You’re reading it right now because I posted it publicly on the internet. Not on my official accounts or anything, of course, so don’t run off to those to check that this comes from an “official source”. Don’t be an idiot. Nico is still Nico. But still, I’m telling you everything. Exposing how I expose myself. Right now, Nozomi is reading this over my shoulder with a finger inside me, moving slowly, keeping me on the edge. As soon as it’s posted, she’s going to fuck my brains out while we watch the live comment feed.

It’s up to you if you believe this is real or not. Certainly, if any of you are dumb enough to ask me, I’ll say it’s not. I’ll get mad, and claim it’s an internet hoax, and be furious at the pervert who tried to slander Nico Ni’s good name. And hey, maybe that denial will be true. Maybe all this is a lie, and I’m not really Nico. I don’t really care what you believe, honestly. Just saying it all is enough to me, even if you think it’s a lie. And if you think it’s true, well… I’m not an idol anymore. I don’t have to care about unsubstantiated internet rumours anymore.

But whether you believe me or not, do me a favour. If you see me, out there in the world, taking a walk with my girlfriend… watch me. Keep your eyes focused on Nico. Look at me, and only me. And maybe, just maybe, if you’re really lucky… you’ll see something worth staring at.

-Nico Yazawa

[saremina]

Hi there! I am a big fan of your shelter fics, but I was wondering about your original stories/ideas? I mean, I’m curious about them because I think you should totally publish something, especially if it’s science fiction. Just if you wanna talk about that.

Do I have original sci-fi stories? Yes. One. Do I want to talk about it? Always. (I have one fantasy road trip to safe the world story and a paranormal romance-y horror story ideas too, but if I talk about them all I’d need to make separate posts because I can’t shut up about any of them XD)

But for the sci-fi story -if I ever talk about Empire verse I’m talking about this one btw- I’ve been working on it on and off for… a better part of a decade now, actually. Mostly worldbuilding because I’m a pantser and it’s easier for me to build a world and write stories in it than to figure out the story and build the setting around that (fun fact! The one and only time I outlined a story was Empire’s second arc, and it’s been two years and I still can’t write it because the outlining took the fun out of it).

Empire’s kind of… if you like the Keith/Zarkon dynamic I write you’d probably like Empire, because the dynamic between the two MC’s is similar to Keith and Zarkon’s. I  mean, one of them is even an emperor and the other is just a guy trying to live his life in peace but the universe won’t let him and now there’s drama and relationships. There’s a reason Zeith is my OTP in Voltron. I naturally gravitate towards that kind of dynamic.

I actually borrowed some of the characters from Empire (Marzi, Haala, Kano and Rejya for example) from Empire, as well as the few Galran words here and there (because I’m too lazy to invent another language for a fic when I already have one I can use).

I’m putting the rest under a cut because I got… a bit rambly….

Empire's pretty simple plotwise. Chiro (the MC) gets into trouble and causes some “minor” property damage, and ends up working in the Palace to make up for the damage since they need extra staff for a big event. So Chiro spends a few weeks prior to the big event mopping floors and changing sheets, and getting to know people (and the emperor). Soon it’s time for the big event, and there are hundreds of people in the palace so Chiro naturally ends up spending the entire day in the kitchen.

And then murder happens.

Basically it’s a political murder mystery with slowbuilding romance between two people who have been waiting for years to meet again, and they’re both awkward and unsure of what to do.

Rez’s (the emperor) entire existence can be summed up with ‘lol yolo!’ *five seconds later* ‘I regret every decision I’ve ever made’. Because he’s actually a being of pure energy who possessed a baby (not against anyone’s wishes) and he was an idiot who didn’t really think how hard it could be to go from being able to travel the universe and shift through time and space as he pleased to having to, you know, eat and sleep and exist linearly and not zip around the cosmos as he pleases. Not to mention that he couldn’t cram all the knowledge he had into a physical being so he’s stuck being vaguely aware that he might have superpowers but he can’t access them, and he doesn’t really know what he is.

And Chiro just wants to live in peace. Let him do his job without any drama and he’s happy. Maybe give him a book to read. Or paper to draw on. Just don’t lock the doors because he’s gonna have a panic attack if you do. And don’t murder anyone while there’s hundreds of possible suspects around because he does not need that in his life! He just wants to dust shelves and fetch tea and help Rez decide which fashion trends to follow and maybe get Rez to try out new hairstyles. But since there is murder, he will grudgingly help figure out who the murderer is. Mostly because he might be on the hit list too and he likes, you know, being alive.

Then there’s Kaiku who is just... he’s an ass. But a very polite one. He’ll politely take over your empire if you’re not careful around him. You could shoot an arrow at him and he’ll smile at you and apologize for getting in your way while plotting the ways he could destroy you. He’s prone to getting sick at the sight of violence so your destruction will most likely be fairly painless, at least physically.

And Haala and Marzi are Haala and Marzi.

The world itself is.... it’s interesting to me, at least. There’s different countries and cultures and religions, and humans moving in to another planet to live among the natives and their struggles there, and there’s political drama and borderline paranormal events and thousands of years of history and space travel and space pirates and you can definitely tell I’ve spent more time building the world than the actual story but still.

I’m probably gonna write something set in the Empire verse during NaNoWriMo. I haven’t written anything set in that setting and I miss that world and the characters.

I don’t know if Empire is a verse I’d ever publish anything from -maybe something to do with Vicious and her crew (because space pirates are awesome), but Chiro and Rez and their story is definitely one of my dearest original stories because they’re both some of my oldest OC’s that have actually stuck around, and they’ve gone through so much change and growth during the years that they’re completely different from what they were in the beginning, but they’re also the ones I’m most comfortable with.

I’m gonna stop now before I start talking about how Chiro and Reziya met and the complexities of their relationship, because if I start talking about that I’ll never stop XD

[ladytauria]

One thing I like about Chiro is that he's both very mild and peaceful and yet has a righteous temper and sharp edge you do not want to mess with. He's got bite and is not afraid take advantage of peoples perception of him to get their guard down (he's clever enough to know when violence alone won't help). It's funny that other then Antauri, the other monkeys don't seem to notice this more cut throat side of Chiro (that possibly reminded Antauri of Mandarin in some ways). They just see their -

2 little brother/pure leader. Any behaviour that could be considered a flaw (not saying those qualities are flaws. But he does have flaws) it seen as cute or met with a lot of patience w/no real irritation. It might be because he’s the leader who did not betray them and the first person they’re essentially raising. But some real bias is there. Maybe Antauri partly also kept his distance because he also didnt want to get bias (like he could have been for Mandarin) and keep a honest perspective.

Mmmmm, to tell you the truth, Anon, I don’t think the monkeys disregard or brush off that side at all. They’re superheroes who’s job it is to protect Shuggazoom from the Skeleton King. There’s a certain degree of sharp edges you have to have to do that.

Chiro’s clever. Like you said, he knows that kicking butt isn’t the only way to win a fight—or even the best way. But he isn’t the only one who uses people’s perceptions against them! Look at Sprx in World of Giants, for instance. The people saw a shiny knight, so he gave them a shiny knight. (Until it backfired, but.)

As for the temper issue, well, I kind of cover that at the end ;)

HOWEVER, I do agree with you on the Antauri issue. (And that the monkey team is biased, but. He’s their kid.) Chiro is a child. 13/14. (I’m probably going to still write him as 15, but the canon age is different!) A child who’s right in the stage of life where he’s figuring out who he is and what to do with that. And, some people (Mandarin, for instance) are perfectly willing to try and take advantage of that.

It wasn’t until Chiro rebuffed him, chose the monkey team and Shuggazoom over Mandarin that Antauri really started to warm up to him. (Though I personally believe it took until Antauri’s Masters for him to really admit and accept that.) He kept his distance, but that’s when he saw that Chiro wasn’t going to let that occasional temper and harsher side win out.

The others already saw that, and I think that’s a big factor in why they don’t seem to mind that he has those sides, because he uses them in productive ways. He already knows the lesson that Antauri imparted to Nova—“There’s a time and a place to lose your temper.” (Or some such.) Maybe he learned it in the early days, the ones we didn’t get to see, or maybe he came to them that way. Whichever. :P

All of that said, that’s one of my favorite aspects of Chiro too. He has a good balance of empathy/compassion and cunning/severity. (I think that’s the word to use here! It’s been a long day, lol.)

[archiveofolives]

Ring of Keys and Other Stories II

A/N/SUMMARY this is the other stories part lmao, also notice how i have gone down the final fantasy route (see how much easier it is to just number everything instead of coming up with all these nice titles). theme for this fic is alternative universe/timeline and bc i am such a trash for modern hong kong, y'all can guess what sort of au this is ♥ also i kept a lot of medical things hella vague here so pls don’t chase me with a fork i googled the best that i could :x

RATING/WARNINGS pg-13??/some, very little tho, language, mentions of sex

WORD COUNT 18,659 (which is your cue to run, run far far away)

AO3 here

—

When the doctor had put down his exam results, slipped off his glasses and looked him in the eye, palms on the table, Chiro knew then what it meant.

Funny that between the two of them, he was the one who offered a smile that might buoy crumbling spirits yet. “It’s okay. I wasn’t counting on a miracle,” he assured him.

The doctor sighed, clearly troubled by his stubborn optimism. Well, what other choice did he have? He’d tried crying, complaining, even getting depressed over it but all they ever gave him was a terrible headache after a night drowned in various forms of alcohol. “We tried our best,” he offered, in what he recognized as a sign of solidarity.

Chiro broke out in a grin. “We did,” he agreed. “Can you tell me how long I have, though?”

With a deep sigh, the doctor glanced at his exam results again but he was already shaking his head. “I’d say…you’d be lucky if you made it to six months.” He shrugged as his patient nodded. “But again, I’m cautioning you. There is no certainty with predictions.”

“I think we both understand that perfectly clear.”

“If I can offer you an advice, though,” the doctor cleared his throat, putting his weight on his desktop, braced on his elbows. “Take this time to adjust your lifestyle, and see the things you want to see. While you still have the chance.”

“That’s good to hear,” Chiro said, grinning again. “At least I don’t have to worry about your exorbitant fees anymore.” The doctor shook his head, chuckling. “I’ll send you a postcard from Paris.”

That was probably the last time he was going to see him again.

He stepped out of the doctor’s clinic with a distinctive feeling that he’d just closed the door to his old life, and walked right into a new chapter that had been a long time coming. Something he’d desperately tried to avoid but now that it was there, he couldn’t help but feel a sense of relief. The kind that came with sweet surrender after living in the jungle for so many years. Suddenly, everything felt so delicate. So soft at the edges, like a newborn world. The air he breathed in felt sharp and clear, as if it hadn’t been filtered through so many ventilation channels.

That was the first time he’d noticed that his doctor had changed his name plaque from the old, cracked plastic to a new, polished silver. He felt sorry he hadn’t mentioned it during his last checkup.

But he didn’t linger; with a step back, he started down the set of lifts, into his new life. Suddenly, there was a growing list of things he had to do before his time was up. He pulled out his battered leather wallet from his back pocket and searched within for his octopus card. Best get it out now before he held back a stream of commuters, trying to look for it between his receipts and his notes…

“Hey, you,” a man’s voice echoed slightly in the clean corridor behind him. Slightly rough on the edges, a baritone perfect for oration. “You in a black leather jacket.”

Chiro turned, a bit embarrassed that he hadn’t realized it was him. The man who called was somewhere his age, dressed simply in a blue shirt with a logo in Japanese on his chest and a pair of jeans, faded as a matter of style. He had a closely shaven head, a pair of rimless, round glasses and ears that foretold a long life. If one believed one’s grandmother.

Ears raised a sheet of white paper, folded in four quarters. “Never walk out of a hospital without your prescription,” he advised him wisely.

Chiro laughed, opening his fat wallet again to inspect its contents before be marched back to Ears and retrieved his note. He must have missed him in his excitement.

No, he definitely missed him. The corridor only had one exit and it was the one he was walking out of.

“Thank you,” he said as he opened up the paper, and smiled, all teeth. It was the brochure of some new phone shop he’d passed in one of the malls in Wan Chai, printed from a home computer and then photocopied with a handwritten correction.

He folded it in quarters again. Walking backwards, he raised the brochure between his fingers and replied, “Never look at another man’s prescription.” Ears’ brows furrowed and he frowned. Chiro turned back on his way.

Seems he was off to a good start.

⚭

By the time Chiro had gotten back to his flat near Tin Hau station, a modest bachelor pad that was 5 years well past its prime but kept clean thanks purely to his efforts, half the day had already gone by.

The mew came while he was in the kitchen, attracted by the ringing of his keys that hit the glass table after he’d put down his grocery bags. “I’m here,” he called back to the sound, shrugging off his jacket. “Mobius?”

Mobius appeared with another meow, a cream tabby cat very happy with his diet, slinking through the open doorway en route to the man. His appearance made him smile widely. “There you are!” Chiro said triumphantly. He pulled up his jeans to crouch, then extended both his arms to the cat who ambled over excitedly, like a pet who knew that a treat was forthcoming. “Sorry I’m late, I lost track of time.” There was no reply, of course, except for the cat’s two forepaws which he lifted onto one knee so that the man could pet him. “I went to the bank, and I think I might have gone a bit overboard in the grocery mart. Money could be a problem soon, but I guess I’ll figure something out.” Mobius made a purr, eyes shut tight in comfort while he massaged his head.

He grinned, contented. “Lucky for you, you’re a cat who doesn’t have to worry about these things. As for me?” His voice softened, fingers now scratching the contented cat’s chin. “In six months or less, I’m finally going blind.”

⚭

“But that’s too bad…and it’s such a shame, Mr. Yim. The children love you.”

Even if they didn’t, it really was a shame to lose the money coming in. He sat in the president’s small office overlooking the green garden, still dressed in the white tangzhuang he sometimes wore during his sessions with the children. Outside, those young bodies in their colorful gym wear, some even in proper changshan dresses or shirts like his own, moved patiently, carefully to the music they put on for their Tai Chi lessons. They were surrounded by a sparse wall of nurses in white, visiting parents and some kids in wheelchairs who couldn’t always join but still enjoyed watching.

Chiro smiled apologetically. “I don’t want to leave the kids, too, but I need to look after myself for now. I’ll keep coming back for as long as I can still see, but my field of vision is getting narrower and narrower…”

“Of course, that’s completely understandable,” the president said but she still looked and sounded disappointed. “In any case, you can still come and visit. You will, won’t you? Even when you’re…”

“Blind?” He grinned. “It’s a shame but nothing to be ashamed about.” The president looked uncomfortable. “But of course, I will. Once I’ve learned how to live without my eyes…maybe I can come back and continue the lessons.”

“Oh, that would be good!” The president sounded relieved, for whatever reason. It was true that they were acquaintances before—he wouldn’t have gotten this job if they weren’t—but there must be hundreds of Tai Chi practitioners scattered around Hong Kong Island, hell even within Wan Chai District alone. He didn’t think she’d have much trouble looking for a suitable replacement,assuming this was the plan now. “Have you told the kids?” she asked.

He couldn’t answer quickly enough. His spirits faltered a little, just as the melody playing from the radio in the garden was rising. “I’ll tell them before I go,” he decided. He’ll just have to find the right words first.

⚭

The great thing about speaking with children was that they had no sense of gravity and dread. It only took him all of five minutes to satisfy the bubbling curiosity of the young ones seated around him on the grass, and then he was saying goodbye to them as they headed off, back to their rooms to rest.

Perhaps it helped that he hadn’t been with the children’s hospital all that long, which certainly didn’t explain the multitude of pictures he had with them. His first class, lots of birthdays, going away parties for the kids finally going home.

Counting the faces he was going to have to leave behind from one of his class photos, he realized suddenly that he didn’t know what to do with his photographs once he’d lost his sight. And he was so fond of them. He lived alone but he’d surrounded himself with pictures of his friends, his travels, himself in some of the best places he’d once only dreamed of as a child obsessed with movies like Indiana Jones, as many his age had been. But unlike many others, he’d gone the extra mile and come to Cairo and Giza in Egypt, and Petra and Wadi Rum in Jordan. His last trip had been to see the Uluru at sunrise before his eyes had started to fail him, and then the money he was saving up to go to Monument Valley had gone to his exams and medications. Now he didn’t know how he could earn them back in time before he went blind.

Too bad. Soon, there would be no way he could see them anymore, the way he might still be able to read with braille or audio devices. At least not in the near future. In the meantime, in the interest of self-preservation, he’d had to mark off the furniture and things—all his beloved photos and picture frames—he’ll have to give away, sentimental value or no. His flat was tight enough as it is without the extra bulk. Where exactly they were going to go, though, was going to have to be a problem for yet another day.

His eyes were starting to hurt from the glare of the laptop; he’d been on it for the past hour or so, scouring the Internet for support groups and government benefits he might take advantage of. He pushed the lid shut, set the machine down on the floor next to him and stretched out, reaching to replace the class picture on the glass table just over his head, near the left arm of the couch he laid on. Not for the first time, he wondered if being blind meant living his days like this forever. Just lying down, gazing around his apartment…or not, as there would be nothing to see once his eyes had gone.

Soon enough, he would have to start calculating the steps that would take him from the door to the kitchenette, the bathroom just next to it, how many paces across his living room, past his shelves and drawers and the TV on his way to his tiny bedroom at the end of the whole flat.

The timid jingle of a bell, like it was attached to a pillow that had fallen off his bed, distracted him from his thoughts. Every tiny step after it was marked with quieter rings.

At least he knew that the collar he’d bought Mobius worked. Chiro whistled, and the cat appeared from his bedroom with a crimson band around his neck, one with a slight V-shaped drop where the bell was attached. Whistling again, he teased him, holding out his left foot.

Mobius took the bait with careful eagerness. He ambled to those wiggling toes and raised a paw to bat them only to be scooped up by the same foot and raised high. Sheer feline talent, ability and luck had kept him from listing as he slid down the length of his owner’s leg.

Chiro caught him at the bottom with both hands and lifted him up like one would a lion cub. Mobius issued a tiny mew of complaint. He laughed.

“What are you going to do once I’ve finally gone blind?” Chiro asked him. “I’ll have nothing else to do, and you’re stuck with me forever.”

⚭

“This coming Friday,” he continued with his parting reminders, “we’ll be starting one hour earlier becaaause…it’s—!”

“Kelly’s birthday!!” The chorus came like a wall of bells all ringing as one as the wind blew, as if these kids hadn’t been sick all along or that the cure for all illnesses really could be found in the promise of cake. Chiro, in a respectable red-lined black changshan set, flailed in surprise but quickly ducked and plugged his ears to the delight of the children.

“Not too loud, not too loud! You’ll make me both blind and deaf.” He grinned at their laughter and giggles. “Okay, okay, I’ll see you all on Friday.”

“You’ll still be here?”

Chiro bent closely to look at the girl’s wide-eyed surprise. “Yes. I will. Don’t forget to dress in red. Bye-bye!”

He straightened up and waved to the children who turned and waved back while the nurses and their parents ushered them back in the hospital. He stayed behind to watch them, perhaps for one of the last times possible.

“Mr. Yim!”

He swung left, searching for the voice beyond the limits of his blurred vision. The president had to call him a second time before he spotted her crossing the grass, a tiny figure in a white coat and a green spotted dress next to a man in a dark khaki suit and glasses. She looked like she was going to stumble in her leather pumps any time now but seemed happy to do it.

“It’s good that you’re here. There’s someone here I’d like you to meet.” She was all diplomatic niceness when she gestured to the man in a suit next to her which Chiro took as his cue to put on a smile for the introduction. “This is Mister—”

“Baz. No need for formalities.”

His smile froze in place. He could barely believe his eyes. Apparently Ears had a name, and his name was Baz.

Baz smiled at him. “Seems like we always meet in hospitals,” he said.

Chiro’s cheeks relaxed a little. “I hope you don’t believe in superstitions, Mr. Baz.”

“Just Baz, really.”

“Baz has been one of our staunchest investors since the hospital was built. This is Mr. Chiro Yim,” the president interjected in time, hand towards him. “He’s been coming to teach the children Tai Chi.”

Baz gestured to him. “Does it work? Tai Chi?”

“Depends on two things:” Chiro ticked them off by his fingers. “One, if you believe in it, two, if it’s convenient.” And with that, the formalities were concluded with polite laughter.

Right on cue, Baz pulled out his iPhone and peered at the screen through his glasses. Contrary to what Chiro would have imagined during their first meeting, he looked very smart, and very busy in a suit. He figured he had another meeting coming up soon, and that the introduction was made only for the sake of courtesy. “Okay, we’ve got a table,” Baz announced. “Mr. Yim, lunch?”

“What?” he spat, surprised to be wrong. What happened to the meeting? “Is that an invitation?” Was that his name?

“Depends on two things:” Baz ticked them off by his fingers. “One, if you’re fine with Asian fusion, and two, if it’s convenient.”

⚭

It was convenient, of course. Free lunch was always convenient.

And never mind that he came in a black leather jacket, a plain white shirt, a pair of well-loved jeans and off-white chucks that had never been washed since the day he bought them. As was the proper way of caring for them but the place looked like its menu contained only offerings with prices that were inversely proportional to the amount of food that was placed on the plate. That in spite of that, the place was still so full, Baz had to wait for a table to be freed, was something he had not yet fully comprehended.

He gazed around the restaurant after their orders had been placed and the president excused herself to make a call. A general salmon color, brightly colored flowers, white cornices and table cloths, Parisian cutlery, wide windows, sunlight streaming in. Slouching forward, arms crossed loosely on the tabletop, he asked his host, “Are you a regular here?”

He caught him drinking water. Baz shook his head. “First time,” he said, setting his glass down next to his plate. “It’s not really my taste but my friends never shut up about it. I mean…” His fingers drew circles around the air. “Friends around the erm…”

“Business,” Chiro finished for him. He couldn’t stop himself from grinning when he said, “Sounds like you’re hesitant to call them friends.”

“I just don’t want any misconceptions,” Baz grumbled. “Why do you ask? You’re looking for a place to date your girlfriend?”

Chiro’s beam went straight up to the corners of his eyes. “Why do you ask that?”

Baz pointed a finger to his hands. “No ring. But typically, you should be married by now.” He folded his arms over the table. “So maybe you have a girlfriend.”

“Wanna make a bet?”

“I’m already paying for lunch.”

“So you don’t want to make a bet.”

Baz looked at him dead-eyed, lips tight enough to make it seem as if he was trying to chew out a reply, maybe from the inside of his cheek.

Best not to push him. “I don’t have a girlfriend,” he finally answered. “And I don’t have a boyfriend, either, in case you’re also curious.”

Baz nodded, satisfied.

“And you?”

Baz raised his naked fingers, flipping his hands back and forth. “Nothing to see here.”

“We’re birds of the same feather, then. Young, wild and free,” Chiro said, and smiled when Baz guffawed. It was such an honest sound, he’d even call it pure. He didn’t know many who could be so genuine without risk of being vulgar.

“You have a way with words, Mr. Yim.”

And he looked so kind and candid, like the lines on his face had been etched permanently by unabashed laughter. He didn’t know how he didn’t see this before. Perhaps he’d been too intimidated by the suit and the restaurant. They’d made him look cold, impersonal but his eyes looked soft. They gave him the face of a friend.

“Just call me Chiro,” he said. “All my friends call me that.”

⚭

Baz Ma. That was his full English name.

Born in Guangzhou, he was a philanthropist and a businessman with an admirable, if humble, net worth. Many of the pictures he found on Google had Baz either shaking hands with someone in a sharp suit or passing goodie bags, planting trees or addressing a room full of young children in a plain shirt and jeans like from when they’d first met. The only time both sides of Baz had ever crossed the proverbial line was in pictures of the Qiantang tidal wave back in 2013, where he was shown carrying an injured boy, presumably to safety. Baz was drenched to the bones with a cut on his left cheek, right there on the crest. He’d married in secret some time before but divorced his wife one year later. They had no children.

Many of the businesses he was involved in were hospitals, schools and food providers. He was also the president of two foundations aimed to the poor, but for all his good intentions, he could not escape the suspicions that he had connections to one of Hong Kong’s triads.

Chiro couldn’t believe it. That kind face, a gangster? He tried to imagine it. He supposed it couldn’t really be said these days,they came in all kinds of shape and form.

But he remembered the laugh, his serious responses. He didn’t crack jokes or make witticisms. Somehow he thought it was more important for the man to be truthful than to be clever or funny. It was a brand of honesty that could only have been built in good conscience, and not on the shoulders of murderers and slaves.

He remembered that Baz said he didn’t want any misconceptions about his friends in the business…

He must have been staring at the screen for too long, the headlines an ugly accusation, because suddenly, his timer was ringing and suddenly, he realized that he was sitting in the glass table in his kitchenette, waiting for his dinner to cook. He hurried up to the stove to finish it.

He set down his bowl of noodles just next to him while he read on, clicking and scrolling.

The rumors started when a known triad financier was spotted in one of Baz’s charity events, even pictured shaking hands and clapping shoulders with him. The amount donated was later leaked to the press who, being gracious, granted it the wildfire attention it deserved. Half-page coverages, one minute spots in all news shows.

The foundation’s defense was that the financier had fulfilled his prison sentence accordingly and had expressed his desire to turn a new leaf, therefore there was no reason for them to judge him and doubt his intentions. That seemed only to fuel the rumors that Baz was really working hand-in-hand with the triad although all evidences brought to light had been circumstantial by far. It was an open case as far as the interested public was concerned.

Chiro pushed down the lid of his laptop and sat back in deep thought. He listened to Baz’s laughter again and recalled his easy countenance. He preferred it if he was only “Baz”, that high-end restaurant was not really his taste…everything about him just screamed down-to-earth, even though the man felt like he was so quiet, he wouldn’t even be caught screaming. To see him as a gangster needed a pretty good working imagination…

Or maybe he was just too blind to see it…

⚭

“…eighteen…nineteen… twenty…”

He almost jumped when his raised fingers felt the smooth plastic face of the door he knew belonged to his bathroom. Excitement filled him and tempted him to open his eyes but he managed to fight down the impulse at the last minute. Collecting his breath, he searched for the round door knob and gave it a good twist.

Everything that followed were actions instilled by so many years of living in that place. He reached for the switch at the side to flick it on, listened to the muted humming of the light before it cut itself off abruptly. In place of looking, he felt for the smooth tiles of the wall and scraped at the textured ones with his bare foot.

Chiro closed the door, stepping out. That was one blind route of many mastered, at least. Now onto the next.

“One,” he began again, “two…three…”

He slid and laid his feet carefully and gently across the floor and felt a vague leap of pride when he felt the rough face of a cardboard box against his toes. One point for Chiro Yim for being cautious! He inched aside until he was free of the obstacle and continued. “Seven…eight…” He raised a foot.

Bang! went his knee when it met the acquaintance of a glass table.

The noise Chiro made had scared Mobius out of one of the many open boxes he’d taken residence of, half-filled with his stuff. He didn’t see this but he heard the panic, the scratch of claws and the stumble for safety. His eyes flew open to a confusing world of blurred vision and brief clarity that made him wonder for a second there if he had somehow also hit his head. With the help of adrenaline, a ringing pain and some form of animal instinct, he managed to hop towards his empty couch, carrying his knee on his hand.

When he dropped himself to the cushion, he noticed he was crying. But damn, that really hurt! He wished he could ask his cat to get an ice pack from the freezer. He wanted to try but his leg still felt numb and weak from that bitter argument with the furniture and he was just in no mood to try. Careful fingers probed the injury. By some blind luck, he hadn’t broken a bone but he’ll need an ointment before the bruise turned into a monster.

He’d already started to move his injured leg up onto the couch when his phone rang where he’d left it on the blasted glass table that had once carried precious memories in plastic frames. Chiro hadn’t even thought to check the number and the empty face on the screen, too absorbed by the inconvenience and his knee, before he took the call and grunted out, “Hello?”

“Good morning, may I speak with Chiro Yim?” the voice asked, deep as an ocean.

Chiro might have choked on his spit. He wondered again if he’d hit his head. “Baz?” he croaked. How did he get his number?

“Oh good, it’s you. You remember me,” Baz went on without preamble. “I got your number from Cindy. Are you okay?”

“I’m—” Chiro looked at his knee, as if he could see it through his track pants. Could Baz get him an ice pack? “Yes, just fine. Just surprised. How did umm—” Cindy, the president. Right. “You umm…you need—can I help you with something?”

“If I called at a bad time, I’ll just call again later.”

“No! No, ummm…” He closed his eyes, trying to gather his thoughts. “I’m not busy, I’m not doing anything right now.” Well, not anymore after he banged his knee like an idiot. “Is there something wrong?”

“N, no…” Baz began. “…the truth is that I wanted to ask you what days you come in to teach Tai Chi to the children.” He spoke quickly.

Chiro wasn’t sure he’d caught that at all. “What?”

“I’d like to watch. The children. I mean,” Baz coughed, “Cindy said…that the children have shown good improvement since you started coming in. I’d like to watch.”

Straightforward, although he’d stumbled a little along the way. Not a hint of arrogance, of his rank and wealth demanding the service and obedience he expected and deserved.

“The president didn’t tell you?” That is to say, he couldn’t have asked the president?

“I…” Baz contemplated the rest of the sentence. “…forgot.”

Honest, genuine, down-to-earth Baz. Despite himself, Chiro smiled at this man who could not deceive to hide his lack. What a character. “I go in Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays and every other Saturday.” He thought he heard the man breathe a sigh of relief. “My classes start at 10am but on Saturdays, I have another session at 2pm.”

“Sounds good,” Baz said, with a faint sound of pen scratching on paper. “So tomorrow, then?”

“Tomorrow.”

“Lunch?”

Another pleasant surprise. “Sure,” he accepted, delighted. “Sounds great.”

“Good, good. I’ll see you then.”

“See you.”

Baz hung up. Chiro set aside his phone and sat back, thoughts now turned to tomorrow’s meeting. It made him feel vaguely touched, and giddy in a way that made him feel like a favorite child. Baz had gone out of his way to set this meeting, like the first lunch. There had been no need for it but he’d gone and done it, anyway, as if it was the most natural thing to do. He decided he was a good friend to have and wondered if all his friends thought this way of his generosity.

And if it was true that he was a gangster? Well then, so what? That was his business. If it came with free lunch, then he could be the leader of all triads for all he cared.

⚭

Spine straight, shoulders low, chest open. In his years of being a Tai Chi practitioner, these were reminders Chiro no longer needed to tell himself as he swept his arm smoothly, freely in the air and somehow transferred the movement to his bending knees without a hitch, even with the bruise. Tai Chi, to him, was no longer even just automatic or mechanical. It was so ingrained in him, it felt like he’d molded his very bones and muscles to move only in the forms of Tai Chi no matter what he did. Eating, bathing, sleeping…it was an exaggeration but a proper one.

That Baz’s mere presence in a handsome dark suit could put a chip to his rhythm was more than a little bit unnerving. It was like walking in a shoe that was too tight in one foot, the pinky toe was starting to blister. You could still do it, you could still walk without limping, but you were still acutely aware of the pain, bothersome and ever-present. This had never happened to him before. In the past, he’d led classes bigger than the ones he managed these days and he’d never had any trouble with them at all.

This had never happened to him before.

⚭

A full house, the noise of conversation and cutlery a steady wall of sound, with budget meals that could fit everyone’s wallet and fill their stomachs. As it turned out, Baz’s taste was none other than Cafe de Coral.

It was strangely encouraging to watch the wealthy businessman shrug off his stylish blazer to resemble the Baz that he first knew: a plain black shirt, some nice jeans and a pair of sneakers.

“I’m so hungry,” he groaned, picking up his chopsticks as he inspected the roasted duck cutlets looking glorious on a bed of rice. He looked up to his guest. “Is this fine with you?”

It was very fine with Chiro. Compared to some deconstructed version of some old time favorites like the one that expensive restaurant had served, a bowl of char siu pork and rice suited him much better. He felt very comfortable. And he also felt very hungry.

“Dig in,” Baz invited and didn’t wait to do the same.

A few seconds of respectful silence were accorded to the food and their empty bellies, almost like a prayer before the meal but in something of a reverse.

Chiro was the first to break it, pausing for a sip of cold tea which gave him a great vantage point of his host demolishing his lunch with shrewd diligence. “So how bad was it?” he asked seemingly out of the blue. He indicated Baz’s half-finished food when the man had cast him a curious look. “The food from that restaurant near the hospital. You ate like girl on her first date.”

Baz snorted. His rhythm broken, he suddenly slowed down. “I told you, it just wasn’t my taste.” It was a diplomatic response, he supposed. He realized too late that it would be difficult for his host to admit that he had taken him to a restaurant with poor taste. “I grew up eating this stuff.”

“So we really are birds of the same feather,” Chiro observed happily. “Now you know that if you want to impress me, you don’t have to look far.”

Baz almost choked on his duck meat and gulped down a mouthful of coke. “Is this how you are with all your friends?” he asked as soon as he was able.

“Only to the ones who keep buying me free lunch.” Chiro grinned.

Baz eyed his grin before he returned to his meal. “Consider it my thanks for what you do for the children. Cindy told me you were leaving soon.”

That he was. Suddenly Chiro counted all the free food he was going to miss. As if they really were part and parcel of his employment.

“Is it the pay?”

“No, I umm…” Chiro picked on his food a bit. “I’ve got other plans.”

“You moving?”

How could he tell this total stranger that he was going blind and he needed to take care of himself? Well, what the hell. Chiro decided to humor him. “Traveling,” he said, smiling.

“Oh?” In went a whole piece of duck, bones and all. Chiro was impressed. Baz chewed with his whole mouth as he asked, “Where to?” before his eyes fell back to his bowl.

The answer was easy, of course, even if Chiro hadn’t really been thinking about it these days. Since his diagnosis, he’d learned to be realistic about his expectations but, he supposed, as with childhood dreams, it never really went away. He might have sounded a bit dreamy when he said, “Monument Valley.”

Baz stopped mid-chomp to look up to him, half-gaping. Chiro prepared himself to explain but the man interrupted him. “In Utah?”

Chiro was surprised. “You know it?”

“The sandstone buttes.”

“Exactly,” he said, sitting back a little. Furrowed brows over glasses looked straight into round nearly blind eyes. “There’s not many here who know that place.”

“My thoughts exactly.” In a surprising twist of events, Baz had put down his deep spoon to wrap one hand over the other, just under his chin. He’d stopped eating just to ask him, “When are you going? Where are you staying?” The questions came quickly, one after the other.

“I’m still thinking about it,” Chiro responded in a shock. He hoped he didn’t come out sharp and defensive, he hadn’t expected Baz to be all that interested about it. “Maybe the summer,” he said, picking up some stray details from what little of his old plans he could remember. “But I haven’t looked for lodging yet. I might just look at Airbnb.” Hoping to escape Baz’s full attention like a liar caught red-handed, he started to eat again.

Baz did not. “How long are you planning to stay?”

Chiro sighed, gazing upwards to think. “I don’t know,” he shrugged, “a week? Have you ever been?”

Baz shook his head. “I was just curious. Like you said, it’s not a place everyone wants to visit.”

“The way you’re asking these questions, I’m no longer surprised,” Chiro said, flushing with relief at the end of the sudden interrogation. He gestured to Baz with his glass of tea. “You sound like you own the place.”

“No, I didn’t mean to make it sound like…hey now, are you cracking jokes again?”

Back in his element, Chiro grinned. Baz groaned and rolled his eyes. Chiro laughed. The poor thing probably couldn’t tell a trick if it stared at him in the face! “Well, when I was a kid,” he said all of a sudden, as if to console a sulking child, “Indiana Jones was my favorite. Ever since, I’ve always wanted to go to those kinds of places. Sometimes I think it’s a little silly.” He shrugged. “But some things just never leave you.”

Baz’s face carried the softness of a smile when he nodded. He straightened up suddenly to search for his glass of coke. “I’ve never told this to anyone,” he picked it up to sip, “but I’m still obsessed about those martial arts films. I’m not just talking Hollywood action films, I’m talking,” he spread his hands sideways, like he was holding a giant egg, “proper martial arts films. Bruce Lee. Jet Li. You know the stuff. That’s because when I was young, I wanted to be a shaolin monk.”

“No, really!” Chiro laughed, shifting a little in his seat to look closer at Baz who nodded sagely. “But what happened?”

“Well, my parents didn’t give their blessings,” Baz said, leaning back. “So now,” he patted the top of his thin hair, “I just look like one.”

“But you’ve never learned?” Chiro shrugged. “I mean any kind of martial arts?”

“I tried but,” Baz shrugged, “I guess it’s just not for me. I had no time for it, and I was too old.”

“Sounds familiar.” Chiro grinned. “I wanted to learn how to shoot a gun because of Indiana Jones but I never got to it.”

“I could teach you.”

His brows flew. “You could? You know how to shoot a gun?”

“I have a license, if that bothers you.”

It wasn’t supposed to, he should be anything he wanted to be. But suddenly, Chiro was glad that they’d chosen this noisy place for lunch, where no one would be too interested to listen into a conversation between two middle-aged men.

Baz was still watching him, waiting for a response. His eyes looked as soft as Chiro remembered it. Just then, he noticed a scar on Baz’s left cheek.

He remembered the picture of the man carrying a boy, soaked through and through.

The smile was slow to come, but it was his defense now. Baz’s brows rose slightly, like he was expecting to be surprised. Chiro hoped he wouldn’t be disappointed. “Are you recruiting me?” He looked a lot more amused than he intended.

Those brows fell again in a confused knot. “I wasn’t…trying to recruit you for anything,” he said after a stunned silence. “Am I missing something?”

“No, it’s…” Chiro sighed, eyes falling to his half-finished food. How should he say this? It shouldn’t have to matter but he felt a keen impulse to apologize when he confessed, “I’d been reading the news.”

Those eyes were still painted by uncertainty but the penny dropped soon enough. “Oh,” Baz said suddenly, throwing his hands up, falling back. “Oh that one? Yeah, that was just one time,” he said.

“I’m just clearing the air,” Chiro explained quickly before things got out of hand.

“That’s okay, it was just a matter of time,” Baz sighed, shifting forward again, clearing his throat. “I guess it gives off that image, doesn’t it? Well, if I truly were a gangster, would you stop seeing me if I asked?” He looked at Chiro, straight in the eyes, brows raised, lips drawn to a line.

It gave Chiro the impression of a cornered animal, ready to spring. He didn’t mean to put him on his toes, and now he truly felt sorry. He didn’t know if he ought to apologize, though. Baz didn’t sound like he was looking for sympathy.

Actually, he didn’t know what Baz was looking for anymore. A challenge? He looked like he was daring him to go on at his own risk. Or maybe he was just reading too much into it?

He felt uneasy. He was at a loss. Things had gone cold and sour all of a sudden when they were already sharing childhood stories like friends. Smirking a little, Chiro tried to repair the damage, anyway. “Would you kill me if I did?”

That joke fell flat. “Depends if you’re trading me for my enemies,” Baz said smartly.

For the first time, Chiro didn’t know what he could say. He’d ruined a good thing, and there was nothing he can say to deny that.

He was a stubborn fool, though. So he tried again. “Then I’ll keep coming when you call.” He even put in a smile for good measure.

Baz smiled back. But then, he’d said, “Let’s eat. Food’s getting cold.” And Chiro knew that the connection between them had snapped completely.

⚭

Had he offended him? He couldn’t believe it.

He’d been stumped it since he and Baz had parted ways, Baz getting on his car, him walking to the MTR station. Easy enough to say that Baz had cared what he thought of him but why should he? They weren’t…

Well, they were friends. Of a sort. They were employer and employee, they were lunch buddies. Maybe.

Did Baz have friends? It was a thought that occurred to him suddenly, lying down in bed, staring at the dark. Mobius’ curled form was pressed up next to him, breathing but unmoving even with the hand idly scratching his back. The distinction between friends…from the business and…well, perhaps the “realer” sort seemed to be important to Baz. He’d never told his childhood dream to anyone but him. At the time Baz had said that to him, he hadn’t given that admission much thought, being too thrilled by what was shared. Now those words echoed back to him with meaning, and he was shocked that he hadn’t noticed it at first.

Why him, though? Was Baz concerned that he might have truly felt silly about his own boyhood tale? That was the only thing he could think of. Baz couldn’t believe that they were truly birds of a feather, could he? He wasn’t naive, he couldn’t be. If he really were a gangster…

But if he wasn’t…

Well, what did that change? The fact of the matter was that he couldn’t stay silent about this. If he had offended Baz, then it was up to him to do something about it. He sat up on his bed and reached for his phone to call the man.

It rang endlessly. Now Chiro wondered if Baz was refusing to answer his phone after his carelessness. For the first time, he felt irritated at himself. Why did it matter to him if Baz was a gangster? Was it because of the scar? The picture? Could he not believe that a man could both be kind and a gangster? He remembered the way he’d looked at him. That cornered animal.

The ringing stopped. “Chiro? Chiro, is everything okay?”

Chiro froze. Why had he called again? He swallowed. “Umm…hi. Everything’s okay…sorry, are you busy? Should I call another time?”

There was a long pause. “Chiro, do you know what time it is?”

He didn’t. He’d packed away his desk clock because he didn’t want to trip on its wire while he was busy redecorating. He was yet to buy a new one that would suit him in the future.

“It’s 2 am.”

Well, that would probably explain why he was under a blanket.

“I have to be in the airport in three hours.”

“Oh,” Chiro said. He didn’t know what else to add. “Umm…so I guess…business is doing great?”

Another pause. “In a manner of speaking.”

Chiro chewed his lip.

On the other line, Baz sighed. “Chiro, is everything okay?”

With nothing better to do, he smiled in the darkness. “I called because I thought we could meet again for lunch on Friday. My treat this time. I don’t want you to think I’m taking advantage of your generosity.”

“You know I don’t.” He sighed again. “But I’ll still be in Sydney on Friday. I fly back on Saturday.”

“Next?”

“This one that’s coming.”

Chiro thought quickly.

“Maybe we could—”

“How about coffee, then? My treat. You can pay in souvenirs.”

“Which part of that statement is your treat?”

“The part where I buy us coffee!”

“While I pay you with a koala keychain. It’s the same thing!”

“It doesn’t have to be a koala keychain, it can be kangaroo jerky.”

“Are you serious?”

By now, Chiro was grinning widely. “I used to like to mix them in my congee. It would be good to have some for breakfast again.”

“That’s disgusting,” Baz said. “Anything else?”

“Throw in a koala keychain while you’re at it.” Baz groaned. Chiro laughed. “So we’re set, then? Maybe 3 pm? Will you be coming to the hospital?”

“I can meet you there.”

“Then I’ll let my fans know there’ll be no autograph signing on Saturday.”

“You have a strange hobby, Chiro.”

Chiro’s cheeks were hurting now. “Okay, I’ll see you on Saturday, then. Goodnight, Baz. Don’t stay up too late, you have to be in the airport in three hours.”

“You’re telling me?” Baz sounded incredulous. “Actually, don’t answer that. I’m going to hang up now before you say anything else. Don’t call me in three hours. Goodnight.”

Chiro didn’t say anything, as the man had asked. The call ended.

He set his alarm to three hours before he laid back down his pillow and tucked himself in. Baz warned him not to call in three hours but he didn’t say anything about literally giving him a wake up call after. He just wanted to be helpful! Baz should just think he was making up for calling him late by making sure he made it to his flight on time.

He felt giddy and mischievous, and proud of himself which were not exactly qualities of a man who’d called to ask for forgiveness. In fact, he hadn’t even bothered to try at all but they were meeting for coffee now. Nothing had been ruined.

As it turns out, he really was just reading too much into Baz’s reactions. What a fool he was…

⚭

It was exciting, at first, to have found a new friend, a new unlikely friend, whose constant company gave him something to look forward to when so many things had since lost a bit of their luster. Baz always came—when he could—to watch his Tai Chi classes, afterwhich they always went for lunch and when Baz’s time permitted it, afternoon tea, because they hadn’t run out of things to talk about yet. Otherwise, he spent his days at home, memorizing blind routes and cleaning up, paving ways for a safe sightless future. Some days, he also went around, seeing the sights, a tourist in his own city and country.

And then that stopped. All it took was a matter of weeks, just as his doctor had said. Finally, he had reached a point where it was dangerous to be away from his usual routes on his own.

It was harder, then, to wake up every morning with the same optimism and fighting spirit he had once borne. There were so little things to motivate him these days. He knew he still had so many to be thankful for, but he could only remember so little of them now.

With a happy, half-hysterical, half-maddening tone, his phone suddenly rang, somewhere in the blurred sea of his vision. “Baz calling,” his phone said. “Baz calling.” Staring up the ceiling, he imagined that beautiful photo of his flashing on his screen, that one of Baz raising a dumpling to his face like a smile.

He could remember so little, but at least he remembered some of them. “Answer,” Chiro commanded, smiling when his friend’s voice came on.

“Oi, Chiro, get up! You’ll be late for work. Keep away from your fans, we’ve got lunch after.”

“You’re going to make me lose them, Manager.” Chiro grinned.

“Lose your fans or lose your lunch. Either way, it’s your choice,” Baz grumbled and hung up.

Many days, it felt like he only ever got up for Baz anymore. But he still wouldn’t tell him how long he’d lain awake, contemplating a sick call, feeling completely sapped out of his will to try.

He still hadn’t told Baz that he would soon be hopelessly blind.

⚭

That all faded like the morning mist as he and the man had met after the morning class. These were the times when Baz’s presence was enough to remind Chiro that the future would not be as dreadful as it seemed and that life would find a way to help him get by. But then there were others where it just didn’t work that way either.

Sadly, this turned out to be one of them, the discouragement shaped as Baz scrolling furiously down his phone, his lunch half-eaten and then ignored completely.

Chiro gestured to it. “Are you going to finish that?”

Baz first turned to him with a slightly surprised look, and then followed his inquiry to the path of his food and scowled. “Of course I am,” he said and pointedly picked up his chopsticks for a demonstration. “You’ve used up your free lunch stub, try again on Friday.”

Chiro beamed. “So our friendship does come with a price,” he said—and instantly regretted it. Baz didn’t appear to have noticed but he knew better than to depend completely on the man’s appearances. He had a tendency to remember so much more than Chiro thought, even leaving him reminders in his voice inbox, in a sad bid to be as annoying as Chiro was with his wake up and bedtime calls.

His face fell. He looked slightly embarrassed. Maybe this was just one of those things that could not be fixed by humor. Thankfully, the measure of his friendship did not solely rely on his capability to make jokes.

He put down his spoon and asked carefully, “How bad is it?”

“Not so bad,” Baz said quickly, shaking his head before there was any cause for Chiro to worry. He squared his shoulders. “This time it’s not so bad. It’s not as bad as the first.”

They spoke in vagueness, but it was clear in their minds what they were speaking of: Baz’s latest headline. Another brush with the triad. They’d never spoken of it explicitly since the first time it came up but it was always there,hovering in the sidelines, a tender punchline in a joke. Chiro was always careful, but sometimes it couldn’t be helped.

Like now. “So they aren’t asking for your head yet?” he jested familiarly. Baz gave him a small smile, which was more than he could hope for. In truth, he never actually knew much about the real situation, more than what he’d Googled at first. He only assumed that maybe there was a debt, some unfinished business and these headlines served as a constant reminder for Baz that he hadn’t quite escaped his fate yet.

It was easy to conceive these ideas so nonchalantly, but when Chiro began to think seriously about them, he had to worry.

“It’s a press nightmare. That’s all it is,” Baz said dismissively. He put down his phone and turned it over, face down. “It’s a headache that I’m sick of.”

“So what are you going to do?”

“Do? Nothing. You just,” Baz waved a fly over his head, “you just wait for them to forget about it.”

“That’s it?” Chiro frowned. “So you’ll just let it keep coming back to you like a nightmare. Like flu.” He couldn’t imagine it.

“I say anything about it, it’s only going to blow up in my face.” Baz raised a brow. “The only time this is going to end is if I die.”

“Baz.”

Baz blinked and furrowed his brows, a little perplexed at Chiro’s tense response.

In all aspects, it was probably an overreaction. One didn’t need to be as old as he to know how the public worked, how the media liked to play them. How much worth these stories had, how much people loved this stuff—a good Samaritan with a shady past. He couldn’t bare the thought of a dim future without his friend, though. No Baz to watch his class, no Baz to talk with over lunch and coffee. He was already losing his eyes, he didn’t want to lose more than that. But because of that, what Baz had said to him had surpassed the boundaries of common sense. It was tempting fate now.

He didn’t want to explain all that, of course, and it was inappropriate besides. Baz was an adult, he could look after himself without someone hawking behind his back. He had no excuses for how he felt either.

He stood up just then, a little abruptly. “Excuse me, I need to use the bathroom.”

“Hey, careful, you nearly hit someone there.”

He couldn’t tell if Baz was joking about that or not. He couldn’t see to be sure. He smiled for what it’s worth and turned, walking fast.

He didn’t see the young lady coming swiftly from his side. Didn’t see the tray of tea, milk tea and soft drinks she was carrying until he felt cold water splashing down his side. His elbow rang when it hit the tray. The chorus of plastic glasses falling to the floor felt like a siren in his head.

He froze, looking at the gaping woman, aghast. He didn’t see her coming. He hadn’t seen her coming. His drenched shirt and jeans felt cold against his skin.

It’s happened. He’d caused an accident.

“Uh…uncle, I’m sorry!”

“I’m sorry,” Chiro hurried to correct her, reaching for the tray of debris she still carried uncertainly. The restaurant felt too quiet for him. She looked like a high school student, intimidated perhaps by his age. The poor thing, it wasn’t her fault. “Are you okay?”

All his efforts to set her at ease were dashed when a chair groaned and whined against the floor and cutlery jumped, like someone had banged their legs too hard on the underside of the table, racing to stand. Chiro looked warily at Baz on his feet, stunned and staring.

Of course, Baz had seen it all.

⚭

“There’s no need for you to drive me home, I can take the train.”

“You’re crazy if you think you can ride the MTR looking like that. Get in, I’m not going anywhere without you.”

That was how Chiro found himself riding beside his friend, strapped in in spite of his protests (“I’ve got tea all over me, I’m only going to ruin your seat.” “Do you know how to put on a seat belt or do I have to do it myself?”), cruising down roads as if there was a hospital emergency. He felt severely conscious in his wet shirt and pants and somehow, that convinced him that it was much better to watch the city zip past and ignore his gracious driver. Baz didn’t listen to music. His car smelt vaguely of a floral incense and hummed quietly.

A pendant of a bird with wings that met at the tips, forming a full circle, dangled from his rear-view mirror.

⚭

“Make yourself at home. I’ll just change quickly.”

Chiro felt like he was moving in a way that would get him away from his sudden guest as fast as he could. He’d left the door open and the keys in the knob so that Baz had to be the one to close it after him and find his way around the plain apartment room. There was not much to see in it anymore: his kitchen utensils were neatly laid out on the kitchenette’s counter with a striking absence of knives because he didn’t want to hurt himself—and that was all of them. His dining set, round though his table was, had been pushed off to a corner where he would not bang himself against it. As for the living room, all its shelves had already been hollowed out, its contents moved to open boxes beside the couch and the TV set, all pushed up to the wall, leaving a clean space smack dab in the middle.

“So when did you decide to move?” Baz asked conversationally while Chiro was inside his bedroom, changing clothes in a hurry. Mobius was there, crouching under his bed, ears alert, hiding from the rare visitor. He grinned at the poor cat and pressed a finger to his lips. And then he heard the shift of boxes and the clack of plastic frames. In a panic, he stumbled out, neglecting to put on his slippers.

“Just redecorating,” he spat out. He found Baz sitting on his couch, rummaging through his stuff. Two photo frames had been set aside next to him while another one was pinned in one hand. He couldn’t see it clearly anymore but he knew it was one of the shots he’d taken of Petra, so many years back.

His guest straightened up, inspecting another picture. “You took these?”

“Most of them,” Chiro admitted, padding quietly in his socks to sit near his friend. Baz bent to pick another frame from the depths of the box between his feet. He saw they were both of Uluru.

“They look great,” Baz said, sitting back. “You should put them where the morning sun hits first.”

Chiro shrugged. “Too bad I don’t have many windows.” A heartbeat later, he confessed quietly, “Actually, I’m packing them away.”

Baz put down the pictures. He turned to Chiro with his brows curled again. “How come?” he asked. “These are good pictures,” he said again, even showing him one to prove his point.

Chiro smiled, all teeth. “If you want them so much, keep them. I don’t mind.” It was a sudden decision but a surprisingly easy one. He really didn’t mind. It was a better prospect than leaving them in a locker storage and forgetting all about them. Maybe forever. Besides, what would Baz do with them, sell them to scammers?

Baz considered his offer. Bending a little, he sorted through the many framed memories stacked neatly in the box. “You’re sure?”

“Absolutely.”

He straightened up again and looked at Uluru, then Petra.

“Well then,” showing both pictures to their photographer, Baz said, “Don’t mind if I do.”

⚭

Baz picked five, then a dozen.

He went home that day with boxes full of photographs and books.

That night, Chiro explored his barren apartment with his cat weaving around his legs, feeling its emptiness. Not for the first and the last time, he observed that this was going to be his future. Hollow. Nothing to see.

“Well, Mobius, this is it,” he told the cat quietly, running his big toe down his spine. “Our future. Just you and me and an empty house.”

⚭

The next evening, Baz called.

“Are you busy?” he asked, voice rough.

That put Chiro on his toes in an instant, the hairs at the back of his neck rising. In the silence of his living room, Baz may as well have echoed. “I’m not,” he answered instantly. He was studying braille, one of those DIY kits he found on a bargain. “Baz, what’s wrong?”

“Can you come out? Can we go out?”

“Can you come and pick me up?”

He could. Ten minutes. Chiro started to get dressed.

He could not explain the relief that washed over him when he saw his friend again behind the steering wheel. Maybe he looked different. Hollow-eyed, pale-faced but in the dark and with his eyes, Chiro couldn’t see properly. And he refused to let his imaginations take control of him, not when hysteria would only be the likely cause so he decided to take faith, and believe only what he saw: Baz looked fine. And that was that.

“You hungry? Thirsty?”

“I’m fine.”

Baz didn’t argue.

They drove in silence, weaving in and out of major traffic, no aim in sight except to drive and keep driving. Eventually, Baz pulled up at Nathan Road. They got off and started to walk.

Still no end in sight. Overhead, the giant neon lights blazed in the darkness and Jordan Road’s weekend crowd swallowed them whole. Chiro began to panic. He hadn’t been out here this late since his last visit with the doctor. His eyes couldn’t adjust, he couldn’t cope.

When he started to lose Baz, he called him, half-frightened. Baz stopped and waited for him to catch up, then walked on.

They went up and down sidewalks, narrow streets, crossing with the masses and then peeling away. Chiro watched his friend walking next to him when he could, saw his chin raised and his shoulders squared, his hands tucked in his camel coat as if he hadn’t just ordered an impromptu excursion for his own sanity. Baz tried to match his pace but whatever was driving him around the city late in the evening, it often propelled him forward and left Chiro lagging. He would call his name again and Baz would stop and wait. Then they would walk again.

They must have been at it for an hour. Just walking, looking, listening. Baz didn’t speak and neither did Chiro. He knew the man had always been the quiet sort, he observed that he preferred to listen when there was no need to talk.

He made a decision to wait for his cue. Then he would talk.

They stopped by a McDonald’s for a hamburger break then proceeded to walk again. Not long after, Baz stopped to brace his weight against a sidewalk barrier, bending low to get comfortable. Chiro imitated him. It was by no means an empty road. Pedestrians and vehicles passed them front and back, splashed with lights. But they were left alone—and that was good enough.

“You know, I should have apologized for yesterday,” Baz began all of a sudden, scanning the moving traffic. “You wouldn’t have reacted that way if it hadn’t been for what I’d said.”

At any other time, Chiro might have made a quip. This time, he understood that Baz wasn’t looking for a conversation. He needed a companion, an ear to listen to him. He needed to talk, without anyone stopping him.

“It’s not that I don’t care about the headline, I do want to do something about it.” Baz turned to face him. “But I can’t. It’s not just the media, you see. Even if I escape them, I’ll never be able to escape the triad. They won’t let me.”

So was he right all along? Baz had a debt?

Baz shifted closer to him. “You know I grew up in a poor family. We lived in a caged home once.” His voice was low. “And when I was young, all I could think about was getting rich. So that my parents and I don’t have to keep starving and we don’t have to keep moving because we kept being sent away. Because we couldn’t pay, because we had no money.”

Chiro never realized that Baz had started that way. He’d only assumed that the man had the means right from the start.

“And now. Finally, I’m here. But I can’t stop,” he hissed, muttered. “I can’t stop. And it isn’t because I’ve become a prisoner of my own vocation, it’s not that.” Baz shook his head. “But it’s like something’s missing. See, when I was starting out, I thought that when I’ve brought us out of poverty, my life will be complete. But it wasn’t enough. So I looked for others. I looked for the poor, the hungry, the sick, the homeless…the ones like me and my parents…”

It was like the admission of his secret had drained him. He hid his eyes behind his hand, and it carried the weight of his burden, his weariness. “Not enough,” Baz sighed. “Still not enough. It’s almost like,” he crossed his arms on the barrier and looked out to the rolling cars, “I’m looking for one thing, or one person. One kind of thing or person. It’s like a debt I owe that hurts me because I don’t know how to pay it. And all this,” he waved his hand around, “is just meaningless exercise. A preparation gone too long. A distraction, a sorry excuse to convince myself I’m doing something.”

But he shook his head, and like a dagger, he jabbed himself in the middle of his chest with his fingers. “Still hollow. And I don’t even know if that person, that thing exists. I don’t know what I’m looking for, Chiro,” he turned to face his friend again. “But I can’t stop. That’s why I can’t stop.”

He’d never heard Baz sound so lost. Desperate. He couldn’t say he knew what it felt like, to be looking for something you don’t even know, but he could sympathize that it was difficult. Frustrating. He wondered if that would be his life once his eyes had gone. At least he and Baz could be in the same boat, then. And Baz would no longer have to be alone, even if he couldn’t fill the gap.

“So the triad…” Chiro began slowly. This was the first time he was going to speak of it again in the entire history of their relationship. “Did you…”

“I needed money to start out,” Baz answered. “Bad decisions made on bad days. I’d found a loan shark. It was tough but I managed to pay everything plus the interest a few years later. Now they’re just harassing me, because they know I won’t fight back. I’d let them bully me all this time but all I can think about is surviving and keeping my skin attached to my back so I pulled through. All for that one person I’m looking for. That one thing.”

How was it like to make all these sacrifices for someone, something that didn’t exist outside of your gut? Were they even real? It was an amazing show of faith, to have lived all his life for a purpose that felt so temporary, but it was also desperate.

And if he never found them? If their non-existence was proven, what would happen? He didn’t want to see Baz come crashing down, burning like a falling star. He wouldn’t be able to live through that, and it would break Chiro, too. He didn’t realize how much he’d come to rely on Baz’s constance to see him through his own challenges. He had to keep him strong, he wanted him to be strong for himself.

Could he be that person he was looking for? It was a funny thought but not unreasonable. If that person didn’t exist, they could create it for Baz. It could be him.

How to put it? Bolstered by this, he reached slowly for Baz’s closest hand. He wanted to hold it, to tell him that his search was over. It was him. It could be him.

Could be. And if it wasn’t him? If that person, that thing existed somewhere in the galaxy, could he truly replace them? He wouldn’t have the heart. Didn’t.

He would help him look—for Baz’s sake as much as his own. He pulled back at the last minute and laid his hand onto his friend’s shoulder. A safe gesture. Baz didn’t look but he responded with his own hand and gripped him firmly. His hand was warm.

They returned to silent companionship.

⚭

“Ah, I remember where I parked it! This way, I know a shortcut.”

The silence this time was full, but not heavy. The city had thinned out and many of the lights that used to glow had now been doused. Chiro felt relieved. He could follow Baz more easily now.

Even being a pace or two behind him, he didn’t worry. The man constantly called to him to walk this way, turn there, and he followed obediently. Easily. He was a tourist in his own city again, hands deep within his gray cardigan. “I’ll be right behind you,” he assured him, smiling.

And then he wasn’t. He’d turned once, and met an endless, empty road ahead of him with no Baz in sight.

Panic felt like a cold bucket of water running down his spine, his chest and his belly, as he stared out at the darkness of an unfamiliar street, with unfamiliar cars and unfamiliar signs. “Baz?” he called out but no one came hurrying to pick him up and lead him right.

He looked back the way he came, took the corner, but couldn’t recognize the lighted road he came upon. He turned to the opposite way but could only make out the dark shapes of late night strangers.

He’d turned the wrong way. That was the only possibility. Years of practicing Tai Chi had helped him recover the rhythm of his breath and he started to think properly. No matter. This was his city. He couldn’t be lost in it.

He turned again to the dark street and started walking to the next corner. The sound of traffic growled past at the other end and that encouraged him. He moved carefully, keeping his eyes down to his feet, watching his steps. He wished he had a stick to help him scan the ground before he had to put his foot forward.

And then he didn’t. A bright yellow light splashed across the asphalt and he could see better. He sighed in relief—and then it became too much. He shut his eyes, but the blare of a horn forced him to look.

He whirled to see the speeding headlights. They flashed and blinded. He twisted away, raising his hands to protect himself. The car screeched.

And then it hit him. It crashed to his side and he flew. The splash of gravel, the smell of burning air. He tasted it in his mouth, and his blood. He heard shouting, screaming. Voices fading…

⚭

When he came to, Baz was shaking him and calling his name. He started with a gasp and lashed out a hand to grab his sleeve. Chiro stared up at him with wild eyes.

“Are you okay?” Baz repeated, hoarse. “Chiro, are you okay?!”

The night was dark and quiet. The air smelled of the brisk weather, sharp and clean. He flicked his tongue across his lips and tasted nothing. He could move in spite of the bulk draped over him.

“You almost got run over by a car,” Baz sighed heavily. He heard the weariness, the weight in his breath. And the tears. “Chiro, are you okay?”

“I’m okay,” he croaked, raising a hand to wipe Baz’s cheek dry. He noticed then that the man was lifting him off the cold ground, and it was his mass that was laid on top of him. He felt warm in the embrace. “I’m okay,” he reassured him.

Baz smiled, almost to the point of laughing, and he grinned back.

⚭

Baz had saved him. He’d jumped out of the corner from the back and shoved him down while the car skidded off and missed. Chiro had fainted for a few minutes.

He’d come so close to death because of his eyes. For one critical second, his life had been completely in the hands of Baz. If he’d been just one second slower, if he hadn’t been there at the right time…

As soon as the numbness and the initial shock had worn off, he started to shiver uncontrollably. In his mind’s eye, lights flashed like the torture of a nightmare even as he stared at his feet, at the dark. He hadn’t even noticed it when Baz draped his coat over his shoulders and led him to the car by the hand, speaking softly and always calling him by his name.

His voice. That was his tether. His only anchor to the present.

They drove smoothly down empty roads, the world a quiet place. Chiro spaced out, staring out the window but the passing street lamps, waxing and waning when they came, tormented him. He jumped at every flash of the lighted sentinels, until it became too much he had to close his eyes. In the darkness, he wished them all away.

Baz held him, and he poured all his senses to that comforting wrap of his hand. I’m here, he heard his voice say in his mind. I’m here.

⚭

“Keep the lights out,” he said. “I don’t want them.”

He left Baz to shut the door behind them while he dragged himself to the couch like a zombie, counting his steps just as he always had with his eyes closed. He sat down, moving slowly; his entire body felt bruised all over from having been thrown off and landing roughly.

“Do you want some water?” Baz asked from the kitchenette. “Tea?”

Chiro shook his head. He didn’t sound it out. He stared out at the shadows, at the vague shape of his TV set, his empty shelves, the boxes between them. He stared at the phantoms of his photo frames where they’d used to surround him. His old life.

He felt the couch sinking carefully beside him, felt Baz’s body heat. He turned over his hand expectantly between them and it was taken and held. He wrapped his fingers around the other man’s in return. Grateful.

“Do you have to go? Can you stay the night?” he asked, seeing nothing. “The truth is that I’m slowly going blind. And I don’t trust myself to be alone tonight.”

Now it was his turn to speak without want of a response.

“The doctor gave me six months. Now it’s just three. Or two. Or less,” he rambled on. “If I hadn’t been half-blind, I would have seen the car coming, I would have known where you’d turned. But this is my life now.” He closed his eyes. “There might come a time when I won’t be so lucky anymore.”

⚭

He didn’t remember how he made it to bed. Baz must have helped him. He’d fallen asleep in last night’s clothes.

He heard the sound of plastic rustling before he woke up. Mobius made a meow from the kitchen, and a man answered him, “These aren’t for you. Are you even allowed leftovers?”

“Baz?” Chiro asked, staring at the ceiling. He couldn’t help but notice how little he saw of it now.

“I’m in the kitchen,” Baz called back. “Your cat is here, being a bother. Hey no, not yours.” Mobius issued a meow of complaint.

Chiro’s face split open with a toothy smile.

“Stay where you are. I’ll come and get you. No, Cat! Get…!”

He tracked Baz’s progress by the sound of paper boxes hitting the table, bowls and other cutlery, Mobius mewling and once, his panicked yelp and his cat’s victorious cry. Chiro laughed.

Baz arrived after five minutes, inviting him up with a, “Come,” and two hands out. “Careful,” he reminded him.

“I’m only half-blind, Baz. I can still see,” Chiro replied but the man’s concern touched him, and he couldn’t keep himself from smiling as he took his hands and let the man pull him up.

He’d bought dim sum for breakfast, from the Wellcome mart nearby. Baz was also still dressed in last night’s clothes but somehow, Chiro thought he looked much fresher than he had any right to be, after putting his neck in the line for someone else’s.

“I thought about making breakfast but then I noticed one thing,” Baz began as soon as they’d sat down and started to eat.

Chiro ate with pleasure, and in silence, waiting for the observation.

“You don’t have any knives.”

“What’s a blind man need knives for?” he asked cheerfully.

“To cut things with! Or you could use it against burglars.”

“I have a cat for that.”

“Your cat will be turned to char siu bao before he can bite them,” Baz groaned, shaking his head. “I’ve got a better idea. Come live with me.”

Down went the siumai that was once nestled comfortably between Chiro’s chopsticks, tumbling down the table, rolling down his pants, down to his foot where Mobius was ready to pounce on it. He ran away with his treasure. Neither man knew if cats were allowed to eat siumai but neither of them could be bothered to check just now.

“Say what again?” he pursued, cautiously.

“Move in with me,” Baz said, and he looked serious. Straight in his eyes. “I’ve thought about it.” And he started ticking off his reasons with his fingers, “You’re almost blind, you live alone, and you don’t even have knives.” He leaned back against his seat, crossing his arms. “I have a chef that comes in every day and I hire an agency to keep my house clean.”

“Where do you live, Macau? In a casino?” Chiro stared at him. “Or is that your house in Disneyland? Is that where you keep all your mistresses?” It was a subtle jab on his now-confirmed gang connections.

Baz raised a brow. “I live in Ocean Park,” he said nonchalantly.

Chiro’s laughter burst out in a painful spurt through his nose before it opened up to a full-blown glee. He fell back to his own chair, curling at the pain on his side from where he’d landed last night, but damn if he stopped laughing just for that. “No shit?” he gasped after, sighing, in tears.

“No shit. Dolphins keep the burglars away from my house.”

Chiro laughed again but by now, he was too sapped from the first quip to keep it going for long. So then he sat like a melted puddle, catching his breath with blissful sighs. “Ah, it feels good to laugh, doesn’t it?” He chuckled. He turned his head ever so slightly to his friend who began to eat again. “Why should I live with you?”

“Are you deaf? I thought you were just blind.” Baz slurped in a mouthful of golden jellyfish.

“No, why should I live with you?” Chiro straightened up, looking closely at his chewing friend. “Why invite me? You don’t have to do this.” He didn’t have to.

But Baz did. And he thought there was a sadness in his eyes, a pensive look about him, when he’d put down his bowl and chopsticks to mull the question. “Because,” he began, “what happened last night,” he looked at Chiro, “was the scariest thing that ever happened in my life. And I don’t want it to happen again, not if I can help it. You can’t imagine…what I was thinking. When you wouldn’t answer me.”

He remembered the tears in his voice, his damp cheek. He remembered his warm hand and his comforting weight. I’m here, he’d said. I’m here.

“Come live with me,” Baz repeated softly. “Please,” he added.

It was not a terrible proposal. In fact, there was nothing bad in it at all. He would have someone to keep an eye on him, he would have company other than his cat. He would have dolphins instead of empty walls, warm, home-cooked meals instead of store-bought ones he’d have to heat in the microwave.

He would have Baz.

It was not a terrible idea at all.

“Fine,” Chiro said, nodding. “I’ll come live with you.” Joy mixed with relief in Baz’s face. “But on three conditions.”

“What is this now?” Baz spat all of a sudden, brows frowning.

Chiro began to list them, fingers out, “One, you’ll help me find a place to donate, or sell, all my stuff to. Two, my cat comes with us.”

“Well, fine, I can live with that.”

“Three,” and here, Chiro smiled slyly, “you’ll have to beat me.”

Baz’s brow scaled the tallest building in Hong Kong. “Beat you where now?”

⚭

“Tekken?!”

“Come on! When was the last time you relived your childhood?” Chiro laughed, giddy as a boy. It had been ages since the epic opening music had spilled out of his TV set as a cast of fighters enjoyed rapid fire screen times in successive location changes. He sat on the floor next to his friend, legs crossed and back comfortably slouched. “I stopped playing after my eyes started getting bad because I thought it would help. This is the first time I’d brought this thing out of the box since. Have you ever played?”

“A little but as a child, I never had my own,” Baz shared, watching the graphics move. “By the time I could afford it, I wasn’t all that interested anymore. So what’s the catch?”

“Don’t worry, it’s simple.” Chiro grinned. “Best of five. Beat me three times and you get to take me home.”

“I didn’t mean to put it that way.”

“You’d do it anyway, wouldn’t you?” Chiro asked, winking.

Baz smirked. Facing the TV set, he said, “All right. Let’s do this!”

⚭

Baz’s mansion in Deep Water Bay was much larger than Chiro had ever managed to imagine. Cream walls, modern furnishing, a play on white and gray and polished wooden surfaces. The living room alone had as much surface area as his whole flat, overlooking a pool with a small garden and a pavilion, such that he’d only ever seen in movies.

“Where are the dolphins?” he asked.

“Off duty.” Baz grunted as the last of his belongings met the floor. “They’ll come in tomorrow.”

No servants, no one fussing over them. Chiro understood that this was how Baz liked it. To have the house all to his own, filled only with his thoughts.

Well, he belonged to it now.

“So what do you think, hm?” he asked his cat exploring the area of the fluffy carpet under the squat glass table. “It’s not so bad for your new playground, is it?” The door shut with an echo.

He heard Baz coming in and whirled to meet him. “So?” the man grunted, stretching his back. Chiro’s things had fit in four luggages and he’d been the one to carry them all in by his insistence. “What do you think? Do you like it?”

Chiro coughed out a laugh. “Do I have a choice?” He started back towards his new housemate from the living room, to the rhythm of his walking stick tapping against the floor. It was a gift from Baz, a simple thing made out of burnt oak that Baz thought he ought to get used to while he could still see. “You ask me as if this is a gift to me and I’m your new wife.”

“Well, do you like it or not, anyway?” Baz shrugged. “If you don’t like it, you can go and join the other mistresses in Disneyland.”

“Other mistresses?” He grinned. Looking up to the high ceiling, he asked, “So I’m to be the only mistress here?”

“You’re the first, at least, if that bothers you so much.” Then Baz snorted. “Why are we even talking about my houses like this?”

“So you do have other houses!” Chiro cackled triumphantly, now standing close to his friend and his circle of luggages. “Maybe I’ll ask for a tour,” he said, bending low to reach for one of his luggages, “just to show off that I’m your newest favorite.”

“Are you making me regret my decision?”

“Depends if you would abide by my most important rule of all.”

Baz popped another brow.

Chiro took that as his cue. “If I’m going to be one of your mistresses,” he stood up with the luggage, bringing his face close to the owl-eyed master of the house. “I want to be the mistress,” he warned him softly.

Then broke out in a manic grin. He couldn’t help it! He didn’t remember how long it had been since he was playful, and it felt so good to be it now. To throw caution in the air, after years and months of being nothing but cautious because of his eyes. Baz looked flustered which only made him want to laugh but he moved on. Quickly. “Show me to my room.”

Baz had waited until he’d taken one step up the black stylish, twisting stairwell at the side before he said, “No, I’ll show you something else.” Chiro turned in time to see him waving him over as he moved deeper into the house. “Come on, I’ll show you to the Red Room.”

“The Red Room?” Chiro laughed. “You mean like in 50 Shades? If you’re that kind of person, you better give me a warning so I can start running.” He followed him anyway, leaving his luggage at the foot of the stairs.

“As if you’d get far,” Baz snorted, turning to him over his shoulder. “You watched that?”

“I was dating someone and she was a fan. It didn’t work out between us.”

“Hard to see why,” Baz commented blandly. “Here.”

Here was a door that stood out among its counterparts for being painted red, a tasteful burgundy shade unlike the one in Chiro’s tacky imagination. But he still snorted painfully, biting down his grin while Baz produced the key to the unlock the room.

He opened the door and held it for his permanent guest. “After you.”

“If you grab me from the back, I will cane you,” Chiro warned him, waving his walking stick at Baz’s dead-eyed expression even as he accepted the invitation. He didn’t know what he expected coming in, but it was definitely not cream walls, sunlight and an open-backed settee in the middle that was black. Not red.

He saw the picture frames all around him last. And there, he stopped in recognition. Of Petra. Wadi Rum. Uluru. Giza.

And others he’d only dreamed of visiting in the past. The Atacama Desert, Death Valley, the Grand Canyon, the Namib Desert. There were so many of them, so much sun and sand and rocks that put together, they could almost paint the walls red.

“Baz…” It was all he could say, too stunned for something cleverer as he looked around the private gallery. It was like his old flat, but so much more. Here and there, he saw pictures of a younger Baz, standing before great monuments of nature. And here and there, he saw pictures of him. The ones he’d taken during his days of traveling, surrounded himself with and eventually packed up in boxes. And later gave away to his friend with no hopes of ever seeing them again. “You…”

“I told you, they were great pictures.” Baz finally came in, hands behind his back. “Shame to throw them all away just because you won’t be able to see them soon. This one’s my favorite.” He walked over to one side of the room, finger out to point. It landed on a picture of Chiro during a sunset in Wadi Rum. In that magical hour, the golden orb had fit in nicely between his fingers.

Chiro guffawed, doubling over. “Do you know how many takes it took to get that shot?” He was beaming now. “Twelve tries! I remember it clearly. I was very insistent on it.”

“It turned out great,” Baz repeated, arms crossed. “I’m glad I saved it from you.”

“Me, too.” His honesty surprised him. There was so much more to see, so much stories to be found within the confines of cheap frames. So many of them he wanted to ask Baz right then and there.

Most of them, he found at the back of the room. Temple-like structures built atop mountains, surrounded by refreshing green space. “Tibetan monasteries,” Baz answered his unspoken question, approaching from the back. “I went on a world tour once.” He pointed at some of them. “Lhasa. Bhutan. Burma.”

“Did you find enlightenment?” Chiro asked casually, peering closely at the last one. When Baz didn’t answer, he looked over his shoulder, and found the sad smile dancing on his face. He knew then what he’d been looking for.

“You’ve been to so many places,” he observed instead, looking at others. He found another one of Baz in Uluru and just next to it, himself in the same place with a similar look about him.

Just then, it occurred to him. Touching his picture, he realized now what this red room was trying to tell him. “Baz,” Chiro began softly. “We could have met. We could have met much sooner.”

“I thought about that, too,” he said.

It was sad. They could have met much sooner but instead, they’d spent all that time as strangers. How many years had passed before they met in the hospital?

Perhaps a different person might have mourned this missed opportunity. All that lost time where they could have been together—but Chiro saw something else. Turning back to Baz, he flashed him a happy smile. “We really are birds of a feather!” he said. It was practically the best discovery he’d made that day. Smiling back, Baz nodded.

⚭

Shortly after he’d moved in, he left his job. In the past, he didn’t think it would have been an easy decision to make but he had someone to watch his back now. So there was no reason to hesitate about it anymore.

Since then, he felt like he was in a permanent vacation of sorts. Living with a rich man left him with no chores to do and all the time in the world for whatever he wanted. His first few days had been spent feeling the house, lazing around, sitting in the Red Room, playing with his cat or napping like one until Baz came home from whatever businesses needed his attention and he had someone to chat with. He learned then that his other houses were another source of income, rented out to films and Airbnb, to families at a low cost, and not to wives as they had earlier joked about.

Little by little, his days regained some form of structure. He picked up his braille again, he started to swim. He followed his old work schedule to keep up with his Tai Chi which made it easy for Baz to catch him as he used to. Sometimes, they walked around the neighborhood as they chatted.

Days passed in a blur. Chiro saw even less. He did whatever he could do with them to make up for the time that would be lost in the future. He asked Baz to take him sightseeing, he watched movies and games and other shows when he could. He read the papers, books and copied down the quotes that he liked by hand. Sometimes he cooked. Most nights, he stayed up late, watching replays TV.

“Don’t sit too close, you’ll ruin your eyes.”

Chiro grinned at Baz’s gentle warning but stayed at the foot his queen-sized bed. “Tried that. Didn’t work.” If he moved any further, that colorful curry dish bubbling on screen might look like an entirely different thing altogether, no matter if the TV was 32-inches or whatever the actual size was. Baz was watching him watch from his door, leaning comfortably against the frame.

He didn’t stop the man when he moved in and turned off the TV. “That’s boring,” Baz said and lent his hands to the smiling man. “Get dressed. Let’s get out of here.”

“Where are we going?” Chiro asked, laying his hands on Baz’s open palms.

“Where do you want to go?”

“Everywhere,” he said. “You lead. I’ll follow.”

⚭

It was a much too different night time excursion than the first one when Baz laid out his heart and Chiro almost died. This time, they parked the car near Central Station where it was easy to lose themselves in the crowd and the bright lights. They talked about nothing in particular and everything they could think about. They dropped by a grocery store because Baz remembered he needed shampoo and came away with a bag of chips they passed between themselves as they walked. Later on, they washed it down with coffee from some b-grade cafe, then Chiro bought an eggette because the store smelt very good. And because he could.

He felt so free, then. Free from caution, free from worries, free from dark thoughts. He went wherever he wanted to go and Baz followed, without exception or a question asked. He felt no fear.

They stopped at the Central Elevated Walkway near the IFC Mall, the last stop for the night before they went home. Chiro was tired, but he wanted one last souvenir to remember the trip by.

He braced his weight against the barrier and peered out towards the lights across the bay, a chilly wind blowing softly. Victoria Harbour looked radiant as it always did with a million tiny stars drawing the shape of its proud skyscrapers and the ferries coming in and out of port. It sparkled unapologetically among its neighbors.

“I’m gonna miss this place,” Chiro sighed, trying to take in the expanse, drink it all in. “This could be my last memory of Victoria Harbour. Can you believe that?”

Baz didn’t answer him. He stood a little apart from the near-blind man but this, to take in a different sight, a different souvenir. One that came in the form of a man in a black leather jacket, leaning towards the bay with bliss in his mind. He had the ghost of a smile playing in his lips, a man truly at peace with himself.

“Hey Chiro,” Baz called to him. “Look here.”

Chiro turned towards his friend and flashed him a happy smile. He defined contentment at that hour.

Baz started towards him, sure as a man can be. Chiro straightened up, but only so he could take the man’s face and guide him towards his waiting lips. They met in a flurry of warmth and relief. Soft. Sweet. A distinct knowledge that all was as it should be. The blissful surrender of one’s defenses, finally. Baz’s mouth tasted like victory after a long race. Heady like wine, but as slaking as cool water. He could never get enough of it.

That night, a man made love to him for the first time in his whole life. It couldn’t be more perfect than anything he could dream of.

⚭

He saw clearly, in a way that could only come from the morning glow of sex.

From Baz’s bedroom window, Deep Water Bay was spread out all around him, asleep. Quiet. Lazy, basking in the early sun. It had a sort of delicate, untouchable quality to it, the temporary paradise of a world unmarred by realistic expectations. It was picturesque. The breeze bit lightly on his bare flesh covered in last night’s sweat and passion. At once, he felt both sore and powerful.

He heard the bed stir, he listened to the sheets ruffle. Baz padded quietly to join him in his observation. “It’s beautiful,” he said, as the man wrapped his arms around him from the back and pressed a kiss first on his cheek, and then the crook of his neck. He felt his soft belly pushing behind him. Chiro never thought he could have such a desire for it, coming awake so soon after the contact. He felt those fingers tracing the muscles along his abdomen. He wanted Baz to kiss them again, the way he did on his way down between his legs.

“I’m so glad I met you,” he went on. His hands hung onto Baz’s wrists while those wanting lips tasted his shoulder, his hair, the back of his neck. “Now I’ve got access to this sight through your window.”

“Just for that?” Baz asked, even as he reached down to test his girth.

“Purely just for that,” he groaned, even as he melted against the man’s shoulders, sighing happily as he was stroked. Baz was a few inches taller than himself. Somehow, even that minuscule detail meant the world to him. He turned to face him and parted his lips, asking for a kiss.

Baz gave it to him, tender and patient, but so full. The great thing about their age, he realized then, was that they’d gone past the stage of proving their devotion for each other. Of being impatient, desperate. Pretending just to overcompensate. Stripped of so much drama, all it left them was the joy of love, and each other.

They parted after a long meeting. Chiro rested his forehead against his lover’s, nose to nose with the only man, the only person in this world he had ever come to want and need. “Tell me you’re staying,” he whispered, begging him.

His eyes closed, Baz shook his head. “I’m not going anywhere,” he purred.

“Good,” Chiro said, looking up to him so closely and grinning. “Me neither.”

⚭

Baz had such an appetite for sex, which was not what he knew of the man whose wife divorced him—contrary to what the papers reported—for being unable to perform his duties as a husband. But what surprised him more was how much he craved the same affection, how a single touch might drive him wild if there was ever a chance it could lead to there. He’d never been so sex-crazed in his previous relationships. He’d lain with his girlfriends when they’d asked it of him, but he never left the door to the shower room open just so he could pull them in. He couldn’t say that it was uncontrollable lust, though. It felt more like two men trying to make up for lost time.

They learned about each other more deeply between sheets and each other’s legs. Baz liked it when he cried his name and when he told him where he wanted to be touched, where he wanted to be kissed. He liked it when Baz pinned him down with his weight, when Baz subdued him but he was always so careful. So gentle. It intoxicated him, the goodness of this man. He often felt like a child nagging for attention, and he never felt guilty when it came packaged in small kisses and sweet caresses. He liked to play games with Baz—his honest, genuinely good Baz.

His eyes stayed shut even as he heard Baz come into his room quietly, pretending to still be asleep just because he had nothing better to do that day than to be lazy. He was on his side, back to the visitor. Baz came close enough to brush his hair lightly with his fingers as he bent down to kiss his cheek and then his bare shoulder. And then he couldn’t take it anymore.

He had to wake up, he had to see Baz before he left. He turned, reaching for his wrist. He smiled drowsily when the man, already dressed in a respectable blazer, looked back and returned to his bedside with his own soft smile. “Have a good day in the office, honey,” he mumbled daintily. He waited for a kiss on the lips.

He got a kiss from a letter that smacked him on the nose. “What!” he laughed, rising slowly. “You just hit a blind man.”

“You’re not yet blind,” Baz grumbled, handing him the laminated envelope. “I just got back. Here, this is yours.”

“Is this my bill now?” Chiro sighed as he deposited his head on Baz’s lap, wriggling and kicking until he was comfortable with his new pillow. He opened the envelope and pulled out the thick folded letter and the brochure it came with. “If I sell my eyes to the black market, how much do you think they’ll fetch me?”

“Not much since they’re way past their warranty.”

“You’re horrible, Baz,” Chiro chuckled. He started to read the first page of the letter, which was an email coming from an airline that contained the departure and arrival times of two adults from Hong Kong to Salt Lake City. The details were found in the other pages: extra baggage spaces, miles, rewards, all the little things that Chiro no longer needed to think about. Their hotel accommodations were found in the brochure with a picture of the sandstone buttes of Monument Valley in the back. Another folded letter, a printed e-mail, was found inside, with their booking information among many others.

“Oh Baz,” he said, going back through all the pages scattered around him now. “We leave tomorrow afternoon.”

“So pack light,” Baz advised him, fingers raking Chiro’s hair idly. “Just enough for maybe a week. We’ll buy the other stuff there when we arrive. I didn’t know how long you wanted to stay so I only booked us one-way tickets.” He shrugged. “What’s important to me is that we see it together. This time. And that you see it before your eyes go.”

“You’re making me cry,” Chiro sighed. He tossed the letters aside where they wouldn’t bother him while he reached up to bring Baz down to kiss him. “It’s a shame we have to start packing. I would’ve wanted to show you how much this means to me.”

Baz silenced him with a chaste kiss. “Then we better get started now.”

⚭

It was just as he expected it—and so much more. The sandstone monuments were much bigger than anything the pictures online had prepared him for. And he stood atop one of these curious sentinels to gaze at all the others around him: mesas, pillars, cliffs, ravines. In the dying sunlight of the afternoon, through his ruined eyes, they resembled an ancient city, long gone and forgotten by time. He felt awestruck and grateful.

He felt like he’d been waiting for this moment for so long, and now it was here. And it was beautiful—like all the other places he’d been to. Jordan, Egypt, Australia.

“You’ve got dirt in your eye.”

“You don’t know how long I’ve been telling myself that!” Chiro laughed, taking the handkerchief from Baz to dry his eyes on. He sniffled, even as he smiled. “The last time I cried, I was in Wadi Rum. I told myself that I was excited. It was an achievement.”

“And now?”

And now, he didn’t know. But he was just glad he was there. Relieved. It felt right.

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” he asked Baz, turning to face him, away from the valley. Sunlight spilled down the man in slanting beams, like they belonged to him. He loved him, Chiro realized that now more than ever. He loved him more than his life could comprehend.

“Kiss me?” he asked. Nothing better could seal this moment in his memories.

Baz approached him, holding him lightly at the back of his neck while he opened his lips and received him in fullness. In the days to come, that was what he would remember more: his warm skin, his tongue in his mouth, his breath, the smell of his skin. Maybe one day, he would forget what the monuments looked like. Maybe one day, Baz’s face will come to him only in a blur.

But he would always remember that kiss. That one moment where he felt like after a long search, he’d finally made it home.

⚭

They stayed out for as long as their private tour allowed them, taking pictures, mostly for Baz’s sake. After dinner, they returned to their cabin and made love. It was just one of those nights that went on forever, where every kiss, every touch would only be the first of so many. So many.

When Chiro woke up, he saw Baz clearly. Like a miracle. He was young, so much younger than he’d ever seen him. His skin was darker, and he looked strong. Fit. A young man at his prime.

They laid under a canvas of sorts that filtered out the morning sun. He could smell incense and fresh wood. Baz was asleep. He called him by a different name, slightly different from the one he knew.

When he wouldn’t stir, he scuttled closer and pulled down the warm blanket that shrouded their nakedness. He traced the soft lines his muscles had drawn on his chest, his flat belly. He knew all those muscles by their names and could recite them in his sleep. He brushed the dark mat of hair between his legs, and then he cupped him. His fingers folded delicately around the shape of his manhood and began to stroke. He knew a million ways to get a man going by one touch alone.

But he didn’t have to try so many. He felt the man stir within his hand.

He saw those beautiful dark eyes open for him. With a wicked glint, Baz smiled at him.

⚭

When he woke up, he saw nothing.

He blinked once. Twice. He rubbed his eyes and raised his hand where he could see it, but saw nothing. And then he knew. He knew.

Panic came in right on cue, but it was feeble and weak. It set his heart racing, rousing him completely from sleep but he closed his eyes, and breathed. This was a long time coming. He should be prepared for this. He was prepared for this.

His hand searched his side for another. “Baz?” he asked, staring upwards. “Baz, where are you?” He felt the bed jump all of a sudden. “Baz—”

“I’m here!” That baritone he loved to listen to, if only it said more. “I’m here.” His warm hands wrapped themselves around his reaching one, and he felt the eager kiss on his fingers. “What’s wrong, Chiro? What is it?”

“Where are you, Baz?” he asked calmly, turning towards his voice. And then, finally: “I can’t see you.”

“Can’t—?” It didn’t take long for him to catch on. “No,” he gasped. The bed moved as if he was getting on his knees. “No, no, no! Chiro, you can’t…can you…!”

“Five fingers? I don’t know.” Typical of him, he smiled at his own joke. “Don’t ask me questions I don’t know the answer to, I’m only guessing here.”

“Chiro…!” He couldn’t tell if Baz was devastated or frustrated at him for downplaying this tragedy. He felt a wet, urgent kiss on his forehead and then Baz’s collarbone on his nose when the man hugged him tightly. He smelled them both on his skin and tried to kiss it but Baz broke contact immediately.

“Stay here. I’ll look for someone who can help!”

“Where am I going? I’m blind!” Chiro wanted to laugh so bad. “Baz, can you just…” He reached for him, grasping the air. Somehow, all that flailing had found him a finger, and then a wrist which he grabbed with his other hand.

“Baz, I’m blind,” he reminded him gently, smiling in the midst of this emergency. “Don’t leave a blind man alone, Baz. Just stay here with me. Okay? Don’t go running off where I can’t see you.” Which was everywhere.

Which was, anyway, his point. He needed him by his side, and he should only be by his side. Especially at this trying time—assuming it was still a trying time.

It didn’t take much for Baz to come back to his side. He guided him as best he could at first, but soon the bed was sinking and he was being pulled into a pair of arms and a waiting chest. This time, he kissed it, just as the man held him closer still, until they were length to length. He heard him sniffling. His poor man.

“It’s okay,” he whispered softly to him, reaching back to embrace him. “It’s okay.”

⚭

“What are you looking at?”

They stood atop a bridge, overlooking the river flowing under his feet. The wind was sharp where it blew his face, but he liked the cold weather. He liked that he was warm under his thick coat and the wool scarf wrapped snug around him.

“I’m looking at the Statue of Liberty,” he said. “And then just behind it, I see the Sydney Opera House.”

“We’re in Paris, by the way.”

He broke out in a grin. He knew, of course. He’d been excited for it, in spite of his condition. “The great thing about being blind is that you no longer need to be confined by the limits of reality.”

“I was under the impression that I married a blind man who couldn’t see, not a delusional who saw whatever he wanted to see.”

“Who’s the fool, then? The blind fool or the fool who married the blind fool?”

“I’m never going to escape this life, am I?”

He was still smiling. “Do you want to?”

There was a pause. He imagined Baz turning to look at him. And then he said, “You know I don’t want to.” That low, quiet rumble again. He swore he could kill a man for it.

They fell silent after, contented simply to be with each other. Baz observed while Chiro thought. The River Seine flowed on unceasingly beneath them.

“So,” Baz spoke all of a sudden, “this has been…a fun honeymoon.”

“I like it,” Chiro insisted. “You know, we should come here more often.” He nudged his husband beside him. “You should use your money to buy a house here. Escape from all your problems back home.”

“We’ll always go back to them anyway, so what’s the use?” Baz replied. “The problems won’t stop until we die.”

“I married for companionship, not for the inheritance.”

“That’s awfully sweet of you, Chiro.”

“But the money is convenient.”

“I knew you would say that.”

“But you still married me,” Chiro reminded him, grinning into space. He played with the cold metal band around his finger, a complicated thing that resembled a bird with its wings forming the loop. The proposal was so simple: Baz cooked dinner, and then he handed him the open ring box and let him figure it out. Then he asked him and he accepted. And that was that. “You ever wondered,” he began suddenly, “where we’d be now if we hadn’t met each other?”

“Sometimes I try, but it’s difficult,” Baz said after a minute. “I can’t even remember what my days were like without you.”

“More peaceful.”

“But less meaningful.”

He might have blushed—if he had the capacity for it. But he just smiled and let his happiness speak for itself. “I can’t imagine it either. But sometimes, it scares me.” His fingers sought for Baz’s to slip between them. “When I was starting to lose my eyesight, I always envisioned myself in an empty room, all by myself. Even with a cat as your life companion, that’s hard. But along came you, and you were there when I went completely blind.” He shook his head. “I can’t imagine it happening without you by my side, crying like a baby.”

“I can’t believe you convinced me to marry you.”

He snickered. “I’m not about to let go of a man who’d cry for me like that. Think about it: what if we never realized how important we were to each other? What if, after we met in the children’s hospital, we just went on with our lives, not knowing what we missed?”

“Then we’ll meet again in the next life,” Baz answered easily, perhaps throwing a shrug with it. “And the next. On and on, until we grow old together, or our lives are spent.”

He turned quickly to Baz’s voice, eyebrows curling. There was something about what he said that felt like an echo. Like he knew the words even before Baz had spoken them, but he never knew about their existence until then. He tasted them again in his tongue, repeating ponderously to himself, “On and on…until we grow old together…or our lives are spent.”

He faced Baz’s approximate direction. “Where have you heard of that before?”

“Don’t know. Somehow, it’s always been at the back of my head.”

“Huh.” Chiro faced the city across him again. “Is that so? I thought they sounded familiar.”

“Did I get it from one of your movies, then? I mean the stuff you used to watch before you went blind.”

Chiro shrugged. “Beats me. I believe in it, though.”

“As you should,” Baz affirmed. And that was that.

They stood again in silence. Watching. Listening. Thinking. All around them, the city flowed like the river they stood over, unceasing in its motion.

Soon after, they, too, joined it, walking down the bridge, hand in hand.

[juniperpublishersjcmah]

The Science and Art of Homeopathy- Juniper Publishers

Introduction

Homeopathy received massive public acceptance as a new medical system immediately after it was introduced by Dr Christian Frederick Samuel Hahnemann in early 18th century. During his life time, Hahnemann could introduce only limited number of medicines through drug proving and single medicine usage was the dictum in practice. As the new system gained popularity in the therapeutic domain, efforts were focused on introducing additional medicines and also to train more practitioners to meet the increasing demand. With the demise of Hahnemann in 1843, the artistic aspects of Homeopathic practice, which was gentle in comparison to the crude treatment prevailed at that time, got preference making it the more accepted medical method across the globe.

The fast growth in material science during 19th and 20th century brought in unprecedented transformation in technology. The world war, priority in treating the war causalities etc made the beginning of a new paradigm in health care. The high incidence of mortality from epidemics and pandemic diseases forced the health planners to look more towards hygiene and public health. Technological changes and inventions like blood circulation by William Harvey, n body dissections etc gave more understanding on the human system. Development of Physiology and pathology gave reasons to understand health and diseases better. Invention of thermometer to measure body temperature, stethoscope to learn more about the functions of heart, spigmomanometer to measure blood pressure and other medical instrumentation changed the diagnostic practices from subjective assessment of observations and interrogation of the patient brought in more objectivity in diagnosis. Introduction of antibiotics altered the medical approach towards sick. These changes brough in the evolution of scientific medicine. Gradually, the science of Homeopathy, brought in by Dr Hahnemann through his experimentations from 1810 till his death got stagnant. Due to the massive public acceptance and the unchallenged growth, Homeopathic fraternity did not felt the need to live with changes that was happening in other realms of science. The lethargy preferred them to remain too orthodox, progressively taking the system to torpor. The conservative practitioners preferred to face the world with success stories, magic cures, vitalisitic theories etc. In fact, no major scientific investigation has ever happened in Homeopathy till it got challenged. A pathetic situation has emerged where even the teachers were not able to clearly define what the science is and what is the art in Homeopathy, making the students and its practitioners more confused.

Thus, the glorious past of Hahnemannian homeopathy did a volte face to darker ages in early 1900. Almost all colleges in USA and Canada closed several countries which patronized homeopathy abandoned it, some countries even banned. The assault from the groups concerned with the profiteering of phama products accelerated to stun homeopathy. Few dared to compare with witchcraft. Thus, the system got redundant in front of the fast-growing technological reformation in terms of its scientific up gradation.

Since 1970, there is a resurgence of acceptance to Homeopathic practice across the world. Organized education through the universities and competition with peers in the realm of science provided opportunity to critically analyze the concepts and principles of the system. The scientific fervor brought in based on the modern concepts in other fields of medicine including diagnostics provided opportunities to look Homeopathy with skepticism. Concurrently, more questions have started coming on the basis of the practice and its theories both from within and outside. Till recently the question on the science behind the principles of Homeopathy was mainly raised by the protagonists , but now the science in Homeopathy as we know and the science of Homeopathy that we don’t know has become big question mark as challenges are forthcoming even from the liberalists on different methods of potentisation adopted to prepare medicines by different manufacturers, variations in the source material used in different countries in the preparation of same medicine, differing standards prescribed even for the same medicine in different pharmacopeia etc.. Thus, a neo- phenomenon is emerging to understand homeopathy better than mere therapeutic modality, as we know now. These are basic requirement to label any system scientific and bound to validate the system rationally.

Go to

Science and Art in Medicine

Homeopathy considers art as well science as integral components in it clinical application. On a broader perspective, in every medical system there is quite a lot of science to theorize its concepts and uses art as a means to apply the science on patients. The ayurveda, chinese medicine, acupuncture, chiro practice, osteopathy, unani and other complementary practices which are based on powerful principles, considered as scientific at its time of origin, but, now is seen by many as redundant. These practices follow the approach based on their philosophy in managing illnesses and provide health care support to the patients. Similarly, homeopathy evolved principally due to the dogmatic practice prevailed in the western medicine of that time was very much a leading medical practice for over 200 years, now being questioned for its scientific basis. Allopathy, evolved from the Hippocratic aphorisms and used unprincipled treatment modalities for over 2000 years, now adopted scientific innovations and transformed as pure biomedicine. In spite of the fact that whether one medical system is more scientific or less scientific, public acceptance to treatment from these medical systems co exist in different countries and is contributing their strength by using the science as they understand to be correct and art as they consider necessary.

The extent on which one system presuppose the contemporary knowledge of science to explain its basis in a language understandable on a rational way makes it perceivably more scientific than other systems. If the knowledge is contemporary, that system becomes scientific and if not, it becomes unscientific. In all the traditional medical practice or the CAM therapies, their approach towards disease, patient and treatment remained constant. Therefore, it can be inferred that it is the time of assessment that make one medical system more scientific or less scientific and not its approach towards the patient. Thus, Homeopathy which evolved from the dogmatic practice of Allopathy is being considered less scientific today in comparison to the modern scientific medicine. The truth is that science, as it exists on a particular time, had provided the key to intellectual expansion. Homeopathy, many consider to be a cult and Hahnemann is a prophet!

It is seen that all the medical systems have evolved from different philosophy and civilizations based on the ethos and cultures of its origin. Therefore, to understand the science of a particular medical system, one has to understand the traditions from which it got codified. Those who understand this premise shall easily comprehend the science of that system and those who decline to acquaint with it shall perceive that system to be a redundant. Thus, for people who know Indian philosophy accept the tridosha theory of Ayurveda as scientific without any prejudice. Same is the case with Homeopathy; those who believe in vitalism, accept it as a refined medical practice. The argument as to what is the science in a particular system continues amongst the academia without much significant impact on its public acceptability.

Allopathy that evolved from the Greek philosophy of humoral theory (Hippocrates, 460–370 BC) in medicine is now relying on reductionist science to give thrust to physical evidences of diseases and uses biologically active substances to treat illness. In that process during the last few years the scientific basis in that system went ahead with material evidences. Consequently, it gave advantage to explain several aspects of health, diseases and cure in more rational manner. Thus, Allopathy of yester years has become the modern scientific today with more rationality in explanation of causation of diseases from biological causes of germ theory, hereditary causes, genetic theories, BEINGS theory, Web of Causation theory, Wheel theory etc. Based on the understanding on causation the body is divided into systems and organs, compartmentalized treatment with multiple specializations. The flip side is that when we study any classical text book of modern medicine there are more diseases with unknown etiology and the art component of understanding the patient has become irrelevant. In that process a new concern has emerged for more care of health, resulting in labeling persons with even minor aberration in biochemical parameters as sick. Thus, there is havoc in society with more diseased individuals, more hospitals, more specialists to treat different systems and organs etc. The Cartesian concept of viewing mind and body as separate identity has taken away the holistic approach in health care in the name of modernizing scientific medicine.

On the other side, those who attribute more artistic approach on health consider every patient different. They propose that one standard treatment protocol to treat every patient is not possible. This concept is closer to homeopathic theory of individualization, now being supported with genetic theories and gene expression models. There is also a view that when two doctors see the same patient, their approach differs, and the inferences also are bound to differ. Thus, the standard treatment protocol, even for the same disease in different patient differs. This has lead to emergence of personalized treatment as a new approach in medicine. The protagonists of these concept questions the RCTs and other controlled models that are the backbone of research models in biomedicine.

The science in medicine consists of theories and principles that form the basis to rationally understand the system. This includes the process of the disease, its general management and the therapeutic tools and methods to treat illness or preserve health. While art in medicine is considered as the basis of understanding the patient and management of sickness including the selection of the medicine, the recent trend is to seek explanation more so satisfy others. The art includes understanding the constitution and temperament of the patient, medical humanities, compassion towards the sick, sensitiveness to his illness, understanding the behavior in emotional distress etc. This varies from individual based on the circumstance and social aptitudes. There may be less rationality on the above attributes when scrutinize from a rationalistic view, especially the physical ailments on a modern medicine perspective. However, in circumstance dealing with patient, these attributes form a major factor. Thus, the art of medicine in Homeopathy deals with the whole gamut of doctor-patient relationship for example, a patient of typhoid, whether he is thirty or not, whether he prefers covering or uncovering, restless or calm is quite insignificant in biomedicine to understand the patient or for making prescription. The thrust given there is mainly on changes in bio- chemical parameters, evidenced through laboratory reports. Whereas Homoeopathy based on vitalistic philosophy, give significant importance on the emotion, feelings, understanding etc. to know the patient as also for prescription. Here, there is a definite co-relation with mind and body. That is why homoeopathy is considered holistic.

The following are the major factors that decide whether one is sick or otherwise

a) The evidence of a disease felt or explained by the patient: a feeling that he is sick (subjective symptoms).

b) The evidence of diseases elicited by the physician and or explained by the attendants: signs and objective observation etc.

c) The evidence of diseases corroborated by clinical findings such as physical examination and laboratory data.

d) Unless a physician get positive information on any two or more of the above in one patient, making a treatment protocol for the disease condition is unethical.

Go to

The science in Homeopathy

Homeopathy, though the second largest medical practice in the world, is greatly a misunderstood science in medicine. On one side it is gaining massive public acceptance and on the other side it gets ridicule from a section of the people who self claim to be the protagonist of science. Often the comments of some of these so-called stalwarts put back its wheel of development and create confusion mainly in the mind of the youngsters who opted to study Homeopathy and the patient who uses it. This makes it relevant to understand as to what is the scientific basis of Homeopathy that could be explained with the hard science as we know now and also art that a physician uses to understand the patient as well how he successfully uses it to treat his patient. This is more so important especially when the system is faced with credibility check in spite of its therapeutic merit and massive clinical evidence.

Go to

Innovation on fundamentals of Homeopathy

Science in homeopathy is the systematically organized body of knowledge on its concept, principles, theories and practices. To bring the scientific basis of the system, one has to examine which of the principles, concepts and theories that are reproducible with the tools available in science as on now. Dr Hahnemann codified the knowledge of Homeopathy based on certain theories, principles and concepts. He postulated these concepts, after experiments and verification of the veracity of its reproducibility.

The core concept in Homeopathy is “similia similibus curantur”, often known as Similia principle. After postulating this theory based on Cinchona experiment, Dr Hahnemann fortified it with supporting principles of drug proving, potentisation and individualisation. These were further strengthened with ancillary theories such as chronic diseases (Miasm), vital force (vital principle) and minimum dose. Thus, his experiments starting from the famous peruvian bark trial and publication of Essay on a New Principle for Ascertaining the Curative Powers of Drugs in 1796 was the foundation of the core principle Similia. He expanded this concept further and converged his thoughts with more principles and theories and gifted a wholesome medical system by publishing the first edition of Organon of Medicine in 1810, and called it Homeopathy.

No honest effort has ever been made to understand as to which of his theories and principles are science and what otherwise are art. When questions started emerging on the foundation of science in the system, in the name of bringing scientific evidences, there started a blind race to investigate each and every concept, principle or theories with the same yardstick of modern science, more so to satisfy the protagonists rather than with the objective to understand Homeopathy better. Thus, convincing someone who does not want to see the truth of holistic care in Homeopathy has become a priority in Homeopathic investigation.

The biomedicine is based purely on experimental evidences and Homeopathy based on vitalistic concept is partly based on experimental science and partly based on experienced evidences. As the treatment based on biomedicine and homeopathy is different, the evidence on effectiveness should also be different. Coming to fundamental research, the supporting principles postulated by Hahnemann such as potentisation, drug proving and to extent individualization are the scientific basis of Homeopathy. These can be demonstrated with experimental science. Individualisation in Homeopathy is now gaining acceptance as personalized medicine or theranostics. Genetic concepts are used to theorize it. Ultra high dilutions used Homeopathy through potentisation is getting validation with nano-pharmacology (it may need more research and standardisation). Drug proving is demonstrable with existing scientific protocols as a hard science. More experimental evidences shall encapsulate the Similia principle as a science based medicine. These are the areas of fundamental research, certainly lot more cutting edge research is needed urgently to bring Homeopathy as the refined medical science.

Go to

The Art in Homeopathy

Theory of chronic diseases (miasm), vital force and minimum dose are ancillary to the core concept of Similia. Even amongst hard core practitioners and teachers in Homeopathy, there are diverse views on its validity and application. We may leave these for the time being to remain as it is or efforts may be made to validate through experience based evidences.

Go to

Conclusion

In fact, the practice of clinical medicine in every medical system is an art as well as science; therefore we could say that the art and science of medicine are complementary. The fact is that all medical systems are scientific on its domain and uses the best artistic approach to understand the diseases and treat the patient.

Study of disease requires the aid of science. To understand diseases, its course and prognosis, complications etc a student of Homeopathy need to know hard physiology, biochemistry and pathology. When he goes to lean applied medicine, he needs to know more about nano pharmacology, bio physics, genetics, gene regulation, molecular genetics etc to understand the pharmacokinetics and pharmaco dynamic of Homeopathy. Innovation in the science of Homeopathy is the need of the hour and also the route to mainstream the system both for the critics as well its ardent followers. This should happen in the all the important components namely in education, research and drug development.

For more Open access journals please visit our site: Juniper Publishers  

For more articles please click on Journal of Complementary Medicine & Alternative Healthcare

[mayacatmaster]

*** *** *** *** *** *** The Supreme Yoga *** *** *** *** *** ***

September 28

sectionVchapter52

padangusta chiro yavat kanasah pravicaritam na labdho savaham nama kah syad ahamiti sthitah (36)

Uddalaka continued to contemplate thus: The infinite self cannot possibly be squeezed into the mind, any more than an elephant can be squeezed into a wood-apple fruit.  The consciousness that, through the process of self-limitation, is confined to finitude (and therefore to concepts and percepts) is known as the mind: this is the result of ignorance and hence I do not accept this.  The ego-sense is only a child's ignorant concept and it is believed in by one who does not investigate the truth.

I have carefully investigated, I have observed everything from the tips of me toes to the top of my head: and I have not found anything of which I could say 'This I am', Who is 'I'?

I am the all-pervading consciousness which is itself not an object of knowledge or knowing and is free from selfhood.  I am that which is indivisible, which has no name or change, which is beyond all concepts of unity and diversity, which is beyond measure (small and big) and other than which naught else is.  Hence, O mind, I abandon you who are the source of sorrow. In this body in which there is flesh, blood, bone, etc., who says 'This I am'?  Motion is the nature of energy, thinking is inherent in consciousness, old age and death are natural to the body - who says 'This I am'?  This is the tongue, these are ears, this is nose, this is motion and these are eyes - who says 'This I am'?  I am none of these, nor am I you, O mind, nor these concepts: I am but the infinite consciousness, pure and independent.  'I am all this' - both are expressions of the same truth; naught else is truth. Alas, for so long I have been victimised by ignorance: but, luckily, I have discovered that which robbed me of self-knowledge!  I shall nevermore be the victim of ignorance.  Even as the cloud sitting on top of a hill does not belong to the hill, though I seem to be associated with sorrow I am independent of it.  In the absence of self-knowledge, there arose ego-sense: but now, I am free of ego-sense.  Let the body, the senses and so on be, or perish - I have nothing to do with them.  The senses (the eyes, etc.) exist in order to come into contact with their own objects for their own sake: who is the I that is deluded into thinking 'This is I', or 'I see' etc.?  These eyes etc. see or experience their objects naturally, without being impelled to do so by previous conditioning.  Hence, if actions are performed spontaneouly without mental conditioning, their experience will be pure and free from memories of past happiness or unhappiness.  Hence, O senses, perform your functions without being hampered by memory.  This memory or mental conditioning is not a fact, in truth: it is non-different from and not independent of the infinite consciousness.  It can therefore be easily dispelled, merely by not reviving it in consciousness.  Hence, O mind, abandon this perception of diversity and realise the unreality of your own independence from the infinite consciousness: that is liberation.

*** *** *** *** *** *** The Supreme Yoga *** *** *** *** *** ***

September 29

sectionVchapter53

tena ham nama neha sti bhavabhavopapattiman  anahankararupasya sambandhah kena me katham (15)

Uddalaka continued to reflect thus: In reality, consciousness cannot be conditioned: it is unlimited and is subtler than the subtlest atom, hence beyond the influence of mental conditioning.  The mind rests in the ego-sense and the reflected consciousness in the senses; and from this there arises the illusion of self-limitation of consciousness.  When this is experienced and thought of again and again, the ego-sense and the illusion of self-limitation acquire a false validity.  But, I am consciousness which is untouched by any of these. Let the body continue to live in a world brought into being by its ignorant activities, or let it abandon it: I am consciousness unaffected by any of these.  Consciousness, being infinite and all-pervading, has no birth, no death, nor is it possessed by anyone.  It has nothing to gain by 'living' as a separate entity, since it is all-pervading.  Birth and death are mental concepts: they have nothing to do with the self.  Only that which entertains notions of the ego-sense can be grasped and bound: the self is free from the ego-sense and is therefore beyond being and non-being. The ego-sense is vain delusion, the mind is like a mirage and the objects of the world are inert substances: who is it that says 'I am'?  The body is an aggregate of flesh, blood, etc., the mind vanishes on enquiry into its nature, self-limitation of consciousness and such other concepts are insentient (non-sense) - what is the ego?  The senses exist and are engaged in self-satisfying activity all the time; the substances of the world are the substances of the world - where is the ego?  Nature is nature and its qualities interact on one another (like the sight and light, hearing and sound, etc.); and what is rests in itself - where is the ego? The self, which is consciousness, exists as the supreme self of all, everywhere in all bodies at all times.  Who am I, what am I made of, what is my form, made by whom: and what shall I acquire and what shall I reject?

There is thus nothing which can be called 'I' and which undergoes being and non-being: when there is no ego-sense in truth, how can that ego-sense be related, and to whom?

When thus it is realised that there is no relationship at all, then the false notion of duality vanishes.  Thus, whatever there is, is the one cosmic being (Brahman or the self); I am that reality, why do I suffer in delusion?  When one alone exists as the pure omnipresent being, how can there even arise something known as the ego-sense?  There is no substantiality in any substance in truth, the self alone exists: or, even if one assumes the substantiality to be real, there is no relationship between that and the self.  The senses function as senses, the mind exists as mind, the consciousness is untouched by these - what is relationship and how does it come into being?  Just because they exist side by side, it is not right to assume a relationship: a stone and an iron rod may lie side by side, totally unrelated to each other.

*** *** *** *** *** *** The Supreme Yoga *** *** *** *** *** ***

September 30

sectionVchapter53

ahankarabhramasya sya jatasyakavarnavat apunah smarunam manye nunam vismaranam varam (25)

Uddalaka continued to reflect: It is only when this false ego-sense has arisen that the perverse notions 'This is mine' and 'That is his' arise.  And, when it is seen that all these are tricks of the false ego-sense, these unreal notions cease to be.  There is in truth naught else but the self; hence I realise that all this is the one cosmic being or Brahman.

The delusion known as ego-sense is like the blueness of the sky: it is better not to entertain that notion once again, but to abandon it.

After having abandoned the very root of the ego-sense, I rest in the self which is of the nature of peace. The ego-sense is the source of endless sorrow, suffering and evil action.  Life ends in death and death leads to birth and what is, is disrupted by its end - such notions entertained by the ego-sense lead to great sorrow.  The anxiety caused by thoughts like 'I have got this now', 'I shall get that too' burns the ignorant.  'This is' and 'That is not' - such notions cause restlessness in the egotist.  But if the ego-sense ceases to be then the illusory world-appearance does not germinate again and all cravings come to an end.  This universe has surely come into being without any valid cause for its creation: how can one accept the truth of a creation which had no cause or purpose?  From time immemorial, all these bodies have been inherent in the cosmic being, even as pots are for ever inherent in clay.  Even as ocean exists in the past, present and future as ocean and the same water temporarily assumes the form of a wave, all this is for ever the cosmic being at all times.  It is only a fool that entertains a feeling 'This I am' in relation to that temporary appearance known as the body etc. In the same way, the mind was consciousness in the beginning and it will be consciousness again in the end (after its nature and function as mind have ceased), why is it then called differently in the middle (now)? All these phenomena seem to have a transient reality, like dream-experiences, visions in a state of delirium, hallucinations of a drunkard, optical illusions, psychosomatic illness, emotional disturbances and psychotic states.  But, O mind, you have conferred a permanent reality upon them, even as a lover suffers from the very imagination of his beloved's separation.  But, of course, this is not your fault; it is my fault that I still cling to the notion that you, my mind, is a real entity.  When I realise that all these phenomena are illusory appearances, then you will become no-mind and all the memories of sense-experiences, etc., will come to an end.  When consciousness realises itself and abandons its self-limiting mental conditioning, the mind is freed from its colouring and rests in its essential nature, which is consciousness.  When the mind, gathering to itself all its limbs, offers itself into the fire of pure consciousness, it is purified and attains immortality.

*** *** *** *** *** *** The Supreme Yoga - a new translation of The Yoga Vasistha by swami venkatesananda and thanks for “swami venkatesananda “ Source:http://www.venkatesaya.com/…/index.vasistha01_months_tags.p… *** *** *** *** *** ***