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lovedrunkheadcanons · 1 year

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Chapter Contents

(Arranged Marriage Pic) Read on AO3

Rated M

The way his sensei greeted them reminded Megumi of a whining dog, excitedly peeing all over the floor.

“Megumi-kun!! You’re back. I missed you.”

The boy glowered. Satoru greatly misjudged his young ward’s tolerance if he thought these overly saccharine endearments would magically cancel out his annoyingness. Quite the contrary. Megumi had been reluctant to come but was harangued by his older sister that they go. “Don’t you want to see Hannah-san?” she had said, crossing her arms in a huff. “No fair. How come you’ve gotten to meet her and I haven’t? I’m the eldest.”

She had a point.

Being half-siblings never bothered Megumi. Why should sharing a different mother and father bother anyone? That’s dumb. It’s not like it was their fault. You don’t get to choose your parents, and you most definitely don’t get to choose whether one of them dies, and the other abandons you like two pieces of roadside trash, never to return. Gone were the days when Megumi would look up at the sky and curse his dad for leaving them in their hour of need. But now he thought ‘good riddance.’ The man was trash, not them, and he had been too young to remember him that well anyway.

Tsumiki tried being the good, nurturing older sister. She was supportive of him and loved her younger brother dearly, but Megumi was reluctant to open up to anyone. Even to his own flesh and blood.

Their apartment wasn’t upper-class by any stretch. Gojo-sensei talked of upgrading them to a sweeter gig, but these offers were swiftly declined. Both Fushiguro children opted for comfort rather than luxury. Who needed a four-bedroom penthouse suite with an unbeatable view, when a two bedroom apartment in a safe, affluent neighborhood more than sufficed? And more importantly, they didn’t want to become dependent on Gojo’s money. In their eyes he wasn’t family, nor a close friend. He was doing them a favor they couldn’t repay. And then some.

“Aw, come on, Megumi-kun. Don’t be such a sour puss. Aren’t you glad to see me?”

Megumi glowered some more. “I told you not to call me that.”

“But why, Megumi-kun? Would you rather I switch back to Megumi-chan? I thought we outgrew that phase?”

The eleven year old seemed to bristle. “I'd rather you not call me anything at all.”

“Megumiiiii. That’s no way to treat your kind and loving sensei. Be nice.”

“Weirdo, leave me alone. You're just acting like this because the others are here.”

“Hey, I’m no weirdo. Take that back.” Satoru picked up the eleven year old, kicking and screaming, and headlocked him in a noogie, digging his fist into the poor boy’s skull. “Take it back. Take it back. Take it — ”

“Stop!” Megumi yelled.

“Okay, I’ll stop, but only if you repeat after me: ‘Satoru-sensei is the bestest, not weirdest person in the whole wide world.’”

The boy's growl was almost feral. “Never.”

Hannah turned to the other Fushiguro sibling for an explanation. “Are they always like this? Diametrically opposed, I mean?”

“Yep,” the girl said with a nod. “Afraid so.”

“Seems odd how they’re teacher and student.”

“Very odd. I’ve never understood it myself.”

Hannah giggled. “They’re like honey and vinegar.”

“Or a sun beam colliding with a rain cloud,” the girl added with a small bow. “I’m Tsumiki by the way, Megumi’s older sister.”

Hannah cordially bowed back. “Yes, I’m so glad to finally meet you. Megumi speaks of you all the time.”

“Does he? How funny.” Tsumiki nervously tucked a strand of her loose brown hair behind her ear. “I know you’re the one he’s enlisted as his English tutor. I can’t tell you how much it’s helped. If there’s a fee for your services, we’ll be more than happy to — ”

“Services? Oh, no, no.” Hannah frantically waved her hand, a light blush appearing on her face. “I’ve enjoyed doing it. He’s such a fast learner. Please, keep your money.”

The seeds to a very special friendship had been sown. Hannah wondered what it would be like to have a sister. Tsumiki would be the closest thing to it, their ages twelve and twenty, a separation of eight years. Not very long. The two talked as if they’d known each other their whole lives. Like her brother, Tsumiki was surprisingly mature for her age. (What twelve year old uses words like ‘services’ in a sentence?) They nattered on about school exams, about the looming summer break, and favorite hobbies. Hannah swore she could’ve kissed the girl la bise on both cheeks when she mentioned the potted plants she collected. Orchids. Orchidaceae: 26,000 plus species with more than 100,000 cultivars thriving on this one miracle planet since around the Cretaceous period. They could be found on every continent (except Antarctica).The same diverse, saprophytic plant that produces vanilla and was once believed to scare off evil spirits. Not counting how the orchid got its name (‘orchis’ is Greek for testicles), they made for lovely home flowers, and orchid collectors were a passionate bunch no matter their age. Some even spent their entire life savings to acquire a rare and endangered species. It was reported that one of England’s last remaining lady’s slipper orchids (Cypripedium calceolus) had to be put under armed security to guard against potential thieves. And like those pesky orchid thieves, Hannah knew ‘rare’ when she saw it. Tsumiki was one of those said rarities. A precious person. Such treasures were meant to be seized upon and never let go. “Do you like flowers too, Hannah-san?” Why yes. Yes, she did. Thank you very much for asking. Perhaps she would get Tsumiki’s opinion on daylilies for her English garden before she went home. She’d be sure to love it.

“Is this what being ignored feels like?”

Hannah and Tsumiki paused their conversation and glanced over at Satoru. He had relinquished a grumbling Megumi from his headlock, who was busy massaging his sore noggin. Those noogies really hurt.

He didn’t receive an answer though because Makoto stepped outside holding a tray.

“Could I interest anyone in some lemonade?”

The children ran up to the beloved housekeeper. “Ah, Ms. Tsumiki. Master Megumi,” she delighted as they all shuffled inside to escape the summer heat and drink their lemonade.

Both Fushiguro siblings noted Hannah and Satoru reaching out for the other's hand upon entering the house, their fingers woven together. Then there were the infatuated smiles on their faces as they made eye contact, a sweet gesture that spoke droves. Were they even aware of how they looked to the rest of the world?

“Cute,” Tsumiki whispered. “Things seem to be going well for them.”

Megumi blinked dubiously at the couple while sipping his lemonade. In all the years they’d known him, the boy had never seen his sensei look so happy. Hannah was laughing at a joke he had said. She looked happy too. Where did this bubbly feeling in the pit of his stomach come from? The eleven year old let out a pessimistic snort.

“Whatever. I still say it’s weird.”

Brother and sister stayed at the Gojo’s for lunch and then piled into Mr. Ijichi’s Lexus which would take them home. They would see each other again in a few days.

July was an active month for Japan. During this time, visitors from all over the country were migrating to Kyoto to partake in the month-long Gion Festival. It was the fourteenth day. The float processions would soon begin. Satoru asked if Hannah wanted to go on a weekend, but with so much work to be done, she thought it was better to hold off.

Running an estate was no walk in the park.

The majority of its rooms were kept regularly clean and free of dust, but hadn’t been occupied in quite awhile. Walking through them was like walking through a history book, regal vestiges of the decadent Meiji era and the long-reigning Tokugawa shogunate that preceded it. Nothing had been purchased within living memory; Pearl-inlaid cabinets. Woodblock paintings (ukiyo-e) by Jakuchū, Hōitsu, and Yoshitoshi. Folding screens airbrushed with gold leaf. Sparsely laden throughout the rooms were dozens of priceless Satsuma vases ornamented in glistening enamels and gilt. Hannah had two favorites; One in the drawing room showing a sparrow perched on a ginkgo branch, curiously watching a spider anchor itself down a gossamer laced web. And another situated in the parlor where she and Satoru ate their meals, illustrating a pair of flirtatious monkeys swinging loftily from vines of hanging wisteria. Each had her smiling. But there would be further additions made to these rooms that would have her smiling even more.

Afterall, this was her house now.

Goodness. What a strange thing to think about; Her, owning a house. A mansion at that.

While traditionally men were charged with earning money and providing for the family, it was women who ran the household, managing finances, hiring staff, raising children. This would be her day-to-day life, and as her first real indulgence as Gojo matriarch, Hannah requested that every room - from the kitchen to the onsen - contain a flower arrangement, ikebana or likewise. Oh, it was grand fun trimming roses and irises and honing her arrangement skills with Makoto, who also found the activity gratifying. Designing flowers was a welcome reprieve from cooking and cleaning.

Though the work wasn’t all play. Satoru and Hannah were busy as bees the entire summer.

Satoru was saddled with missions and meetings and report write-ups. Administrational bullshit. If it weren’t for his wife and housekeeper he’d stage a protest. Orchestrate a labor union or something of that nature: “We demand paid holiday! Sorcerers’ rights are human rights!” The idea sounded better by the minute. The fatigue was starting to show. The Six Eyes user carried Bufferin everywhere he went. He feared he’d contract an ibuprofen addiction before long. The migraines were bearable with reverse curse technique, but only just so. Hannah was less lenient than Makoto when it came to how many pills he was allowed to take at home. “You should take no more than three capsules, Satoru, and at twelve hour intervals. It’ll wreck your bowels if you take any more.” His bowels, eh? Sounds serious, though he didn’t see much of an issue. If his intestines imploded, he could simply heal them with the help of reverse curse technique. But he knew she only made a fuss because she cared. Cared for his health. Cared for him. One of the few people in this life who did. Every day he’d discover a new reason why his wife was brilliant.

One of Satoru’s special pet projects was his charity; a program that provided financial aid to children who had either lost a parent or had become orphaned due to curse attacks. It was funded by both the government - that is to say the Japanese taxpayer - and the sorcerer families (70% government / 30% sorcerer families). Two years it had taken Satoru to finally get the ball rolling and convince the higher-ups that the project was worthwhile, though it took a considerable amount of time and effort. There were 112 children residing in some form of foster care and 134 living in single parent households. The sums weren’t huge, just enough to pay for utilities or groceries, maybe a rental payment on an apartment. Whatever the family or child needed to make life a little easier. Hannah had proposed a new idea.

“What if we sent the children care packages for their birthdays?”

Satoru blinked. “Care packages?”

“Fun little parcels filled with either their favorite sweets or maybe a new toy they’ve been wanting but can’t afford.”

“And how would we do that?”

Hannah smashed her lips together; her ‘thinking face’ as he came to call it. “Yes, I’ve thought of that too. There are 246 children in the system, correct?”

Satoru nodded.

“And we know their date of birth and current home addresses?”

Again, Satoru nodded.

“Then why don’t we mail a survey for the children to fill out, or maybe the parents? We can review how many replies we get and operate from there.”

Satoru nodded a third time, but was wondering something. “Alright, you’ve got me on board, but that’s 246 days out of the year, Hannah. This would be no small undertaking.”

Her eyes shone with determination. “Nothing is too big an undertaking when it comes to protecting childhood.”

Well, he couldn’t argue with that one. Hear, hear! Also was it wrong that he found her kinda sexy when she brainstormed? Anywho, they would type up a mini questionnaire and send it out the following week.

Speaking of questionnaires, answering correspondence became its own undertaking. Hannah and Makoto had gotten through the congratulatory letters and well wishers from her wedding. Though there was still no sign of tea invitations from either the Kamos or the Zen’ins. Hannah tried not to be too put out about it. However, when she found a mulberry-papered envelope sealed with a large golden chrysanthemum in the center she just about fainted. A golden chrysanthemum; The Imperial seal.

“Please tell me we won’t be entertaining the Emperor,” she begged Makoto, dread ringing in her voice.

“Not to worry, ma’am,” the housekeeper assuaged. “One of the duties of the Imperial family is to uphold the secrecy of the jujutsu world. These letters are simply out of common courtesy. However, you and the young master might be invited to official state functions, but rest assured. The Emperor has never stayed a night in this house.”

“Oh, thank God.” Hannah exhaled a deep sigh of relief. She turned the envelope over. “Will I be expected to write back, you think?”

“A short ‘thank you’ never hurts. It’s usually Her Majesty, the Empress, who manages these affairs. Her personal insignia is the Beach Rose. I will show you how to write to her.”

On top of writing to royalty, there were also financial matters for Hannah to contend with; Outstanding balances that needed to be paid. Budgeting for food and home renovations before winter. Satoru and Hannah had decided that ¾ of the shoji panels facing the outside would be replaced with glass instead of washi paper. The alterations would be expensive now, but in the long run would cut down on added costs, as glass did not have to be regularly replaced every few years. Satoru had trusted Hannah to oversee the project. Then there was going over dinner plans with Makoto. The housekeeper was looking to incorporate more European dishes to the menu card. For Thursday nights it would be a mixture between French and English like so:

Might be a bit of a stretch, but she hoped the food would meet Satoru’s approval.

For the most part, Hannah let Makoto make most of the decisions on that front. She wasn’t picky and encouraged the housekeeper to make leftovers so she wouldn’t have to cook every night.

And at last when Hannah wasn’t buried neck-deep in letters, or balancing checkbooks, or catching up on her tea ceremony lessons (which were coming along splendidly) Hannah was given time out of the busy week to step outside and garden.

She had quickly befriended the Gojo family’s fifty-two year old gardener, Mr. Aoyama, who was nonetheless charmed by his new lady’s horticultural knowledge, especially for being one so young. The garden estates he had worked on in the past, with their great ladies and multi-millionaires, had never been this enthusiastic. He even watched her strap on a pair of gardening gloves and Wellingtons, pick up a trusty shovel, and join in on the mulching herself. A woman after my own heart, he thought. About time these privileged ladies, with their sniveling noses and outdated prejudices, come down from their ivory towers and learn what proper work is and get their hands dirty.

During the course of her twenty years, Hannah had developed a placid sense of unquestioning acceptance. She had been handed a raw deal in life, but what good was it to stomp your feet and endlessly complain about how unfair the world was? Better to get on with it and move on. That’s why gardening brought her so much joy. It was her oyster, an artistic exercise to enjoy and partake in while it lasted, making her forget her indemnities. Whenever she had enough free time on her hands, it would be spent budgeting and designing the groundwork for her English garden Satoru had promised; her ‘Eden’ as she’d later come to call it, spanning less than two hectares, her own tiny piece of heaven.

She already had the blueprint laid out. On a mood board in her bedroom were pictures of flower varieties and garden ideas she had snipped from magazine and newspaper clippings next to watercolor palettes, ranging from the deepest indigo to lightest pale yellow. This presentation gave Hannah a visual aid for deciding on color and texture combinations. So far, she’d listed her main frontrunners in a journal, referencing it like some kind of magic crystal ball, foretelling the future.

The early months of spring would bloom ranunculus, Japanese anemones, and star-petaled narcissi, and numerous shrubs of calming lilac. For early summer it would be English roses, snapdragons, daylilies of every color, red and orange oriental poppies, bigleaf blue hydrangea and blushing pink peonies, exploding with sweet, fragrant perfume. Come late summer and early autumn, there’d be burgundy hued dahlias shaped like honeycombed pom-poms, together with zinnias, golden chrysanthemums, ‘Midnight Magic’ crepe myrtle, and Antwerp hollyhock, their heavily flowered columnar spiraling up towards the sun, all shades of ostentatious reds, pinks, purples, and yellows. And then when the first frost of winter finally arrived there would be an assortment of rosemary, snowdrops, and holly; Hardier breeds, making their last hurrah before spring. This continual carousel of blooms would stem from a ‘layering technique’ where once the perennial ran its course for the season, a new one would spring and take its place like a growing-living-dying song.

Trial and error were bound to erupt. Multiple factors had to be taken into careful consideration for this dream garden to become reality. Preparations had to be made, specifically as it pertained to soil. Fortunately for Hannah, Japan’s soil was naturally compacted with rich nutrients and organic minerals from millennia of volcanic activity, creating the ideal ratio of silt, ash, and clay needed to grow plants. However, much of the species Hannah wanted to cultivate weren’t native to Japan. Ericaceous plants, like hydrangeas and rhododendrons, were natural born ‘acid lovers’ and could thrive in denser pH environments, however, if the soil contained too much alkaline substances - like lime, for instance - then calcifuges plants, such as camellias and azaleas, could be unintentionally poisoned. Acidic levels had to be maintained at just the right levels depending on what was being planted (which could be checked with the aid of an inexpensive pH kit). So to mitigate the increase of dead growth, Hannah decided she would make the soil from scratch.

Home-made compost followed a relatively simple recipe; a 50-50 mixture of nitrogen and carbon based ingredients left exposed to oxygen and water, later breaking down into humus. Basic science. What was used in making the mixture was left entirely to the gardener’s discretion; dead leaves, woody stems, eggshells, food scraps, seaweed, fresh animal manure, etc. If making compost in the summertime, the added heat would help the nitrogen rich ingredients decompose quicker and encourage good bacteria to germinate, as microorganisms were necessary to produce healthy soil. This provided cheaper, more beneficial compost instead of buying it in big stretchy plastic bags. The only downside was time. It would take months for the soil to be ready, and even then Hannah would have to wait. Unlike Edith’s roses she planted during her first week at Jujutsu High, where she dug into the ground and arduously churned the soil with a tiller and spade, Hannah was going to apply a ‘no-dig’ method. This meant she would prep the flower beds by first marking the perimeters with stakes and twine and then flattening dampened cardboard over the site; One layer of compost would be packed under the cardboard and another layer would be stacked on top. Since these were brand new flower beds, the cardboard would prevent sunlight from filtering through, thus killing any weeds or invasive plants beneath without robbing the soil of nutrients. Given time, the cardboard between the two compost layers would biodegrade, making food for benevolent garden dwellers buried deep inside the earth (worms loved decomposed cardboard). But composting was only half the battle.

With the plants selected, and the beds and compost prepped, there was also the climate to account for.

The Gojo estate was hidden away in the bucolic Takao mountains, meaning the garden terrace would be seated at higher elevation, leaving it exposed to more sunlight and harsher weather conditions. Windbreakers would need to be put in place to protect from damaging storm gusts and winter temperatures would plunge well below zero. She would have to study-up on the area’s annual rain and snowfall as well, and whether more landscaping would be involved. Not all the flowers would make it through the year, and it would take multiple seasons to get the garden she wanted, but if she played her cards right, Hannah would be able plant bulbs and sow her first seeds by mid-autumn at the earliest.

Satoru was impressed by Hannah’s vast gardening expertise, as anyone would be. Over the years he would grow accustomed to entering the house and seeing profusions of flowers in every shape, color, and scent decorate the halls and window arches, breathing life and color into the space; his wife’s personal touch. Whenever she worked, he would always be milling around the vicinity, snooping over her shoulder, curious about what she was doing, asking questions like “What is ‘comfrey tea?’ Do you drink it?” (The answer was no. You do not drink it) Though on occasions, sometimes his questions delved more into the transcendent.

“Do you really believe the entire world was created in six days?”

Hannah peered up from taking notes in her garden journal. He was towering directly above her, hands placed in his pockets. Like always.

“I suppose,” she said with a shrug. “If you took the Book of Genesis at face value, sure. Why not.”

Satoru looked even more perplexed. “I thought Christians took everything in their Bible literally?”

Hannah smiled, a certain glimmer in her moss brown eyes that looked like a challenge. “Not always. For instance you could argue there is not one creation story told in the Bible, but three. The first chapter of Genesis is separate from the story of Adam and Eve. Then there’s also the story of Noah and his ark, before God issued a great flood over the earth, setting it anew. Rather than being taken as history, the purpose of these stories is to emphasize God’s dominion over creation, and that Man, His greatest creation, somehow fell victim to original sin in the process.” She stood up from her seat. “Anywho, now you have me curious. Do Buddhists ever ponder the origins of the universe?”

Satoru shook his head.

“To be honest, no,” he replied flatly. “There is the tale of the Izanagi and Izanami creating the islands of Japan with brine, dripping from a jeweled spear, which could symbolize the world. But from a purely Buddhist perspective, the universe has no beginning or end, so philosophizing how it came into being is seen as a fruitless exercise that leads to nowhere.”

This didn’t stop Hannah from trying.

“But didn’t the Buddha say that everything comes to an end at some point?” she said. “And if everything comes to an end, then it must have had a beginning, no?” (3)

Over the years, they would have many discussions like this, volleying questions back and forth, pondering the deeper meanings of life. But like an unstoppable force meeting an immovable object, neither husband nor wife would concede to the other’s beliefs. Satoru had trouble grasping Christianity’s radical take on monotheism: How one deity could simultaneously be a divine Creator, a Human (who was also ‘hypostatically’ divine), and a strange Spirit that bore no distinctive shape whatsoever but was often depicted in the form of a dove, and somehow not be called polytheistic. Additionally this Trinitarian Deity was revered as being all-loving, omnipresent, and omniscient, and yet if that were the case, Satoru couldn’t conceive how this supposed ‘all-loving’ God could allow evil things to befall innocent human beings, especially at the hands of His ‘most holy’ church. Then there were the outlandish beliefs surrounding the Eucharist, which he found a little creepy: Wine and unleavened bread that ‘transubstantiate’ into the actual blood and flesh of Christ while retaining the ‘accidents’ of real bread and wine, which you then ate? Huh? What the heck was that all about? He wasn’t a philosopher, but wouldn’t that make Christians cannibals? Plus, this Jesus character sounded very similar to the Buddha at given times, but he wasn’t going to read too much into it.

Hannah, in the meanwhile, struggled equally with Shinto and Buddhism, and how both religions could co-exist without delegitimizing the other. Were the gods more paramount to the highly secular Japanese, or did the Buddha and his Dharma take first precedence? To her knowledge Shinto was an altogether pantheistic faith where rocks, trees, and even mountains could be worshiped as kami (deities). The many myths and legends surrounding these kami, however, Hannah saw no differently than those of Zeus or Ra; fictional tales used to convey didactic truths. Buddhism offered more spiritual substance, yes, though she failed to understand karma’s intrinsic nature and why it held so much sway over one’s life, or more importantly, where it came from; a moot point given Buddhism’s beliefs of causality rather than creation. It didn’t matter who or where it originated from, or why ‘the true way of things’ functioned the way it did; how good deeds produced happiness and bad deeds produced suffering. What was enlightenment anyway? Why did it matter so much whether you obtained it or not, and could all the world’s sufferings really be eliminated by practicing ‘mindfulness’ and following the Five Precepts, and then awaiting rebirth in the ‘Pure Land?’ So many reeling questions…

‘We are not meant to resolve all contradictions,’ wrote the meek Thomas Merton, and so Hannah and Satoru would agree to disagree. These beliefs, however confusing, however paradoxical, weren’t worth fighting over, not to the detriment of a marriage. They had come too far to risk falling out. Challenge and learn, yes. Disrespect and insult, no. Let bygones be bygones and put it to rest.

On a less philosophical note, Hannah’s training was showing signs of tremendous progress. Satoru had moved on from teaching her how to punch and kick and was now in the middle of teaching her defensive maneuvers, like how to escape from being pinned to the ground.

“This is ridiculous,” Hannah panted, struggling desperately to free herself. “How can I possibly get out like this?”

“Because I’m telling you,” was all Satoru said, increasing his weight, barely holding up a sweat as he subdued her, casually switching to a gruff, sagely English. “If no mistake have you made, yet losing you are, a different game you should play.”

She wasn’t laughing at his Yoda impression, having only watched Stars Wars last week. They resigned to training indoors for the evening and had cleared the reception hall, creating a dojo-like atmosphere. Crouched on his hands and knees, Satoru had her pinned in the ‘Mount Position,’ seizing her wrists and restraining them to the floor, while his legs straddled her waist, immobilizing her. She was boxed in. Hannah tried pushing him off with her upper body, but Satoru’s grip was tight. With all the power stored in his shoulder and arms, her hands barely lifted off the floor. Gravity was on his side. He wasn’t letting go. And like all good esoterics, Satoru wasn’t going to just tell her how to break free - No, no - that would be too practical. Instead he would keep silent and force his wife to figure it out on her own.

Hannah kicked and writhed and shimmied. She once attempted to bite him, but his Infinity made it so her teeth never sought flesh (not that she was biting very hard). As was usual with training, he wore a thin black cotton tee and matching black sweatpants, which were probably overpriced. She could see every ripple and flex of his toned biceps and pectoral muscles underneath the cotton as he worked to restrain her. The position was rather demoralizing; a man overpowering a woman with the use of his body. The intimacy of their position felt unfamiliar too - dare she say, sensual - but Hannah ignored the proximity of their bodies and focused on getting out from underneath him. Twenty minutes in, her efforts were met with no success and after some more prolonged struggling, she gave up.

“I can’t,” she said out of breath. “You’re too strong.”

Her husband held back a smile, her inadvertent praise sounding like music to his ears. “Excuses, excuses,” he chided, not looking the least bit tired. “C’mon, Hannah, use that clever little brain of yours. If I have your hands pinned like this,” he took her seized wrists and (lightly) pressed them back to the floor, “and you can’t use your legs,” he clamped his own legs around her waist, “what else could you do?”

“Nothing. I’m stuck.”

“No, you’re not. There is a way out. You just have to be creative. Think outside the box.”

‘Creative.’ Well, that was one way of looking at it.

Hannah’s eyes searched his person for an opening, any indication he had left an opportunity for her to escape. His body was still on top of her like a human cage, squeezing her wrists, pressing them to the floor. She attempted to push him off again. “Nope, you’ve tried that enough times already,” he said, transferring more of his weight on top of her. “Promise ya, it’s not gonna work.” He was right, of course. Trying the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result was foolish. Alright, Hannah. Think outside the box. Be creative.

Satoru’s Infinity could repel and attract various things at once. For instance, if he were walking down the street holding a bag of groceries in the middle of a torrential downpour, he could keep the grocery bag in his hand while repelling off the rain. The bag was allowed in his orbit, the raindrops were not. She had seen him do this more than once, an invisible shield carapaced around him, stepping back inside the house, dry as a feather. This also explained why his clothes - or any piece of him for that matter - didn’t get stripped away whenever he used his curse technique. However, other than shielding himself from getting bitten, Hannah realized he wasn’t using Infinity that much during their training session. And his arms, which were supporting most of his weight in keeping her restrained, were slanted at an (she eyeballed it) eighty degree angle from his shoulder to his hands. Meaning if she got his shoulders slanted at an angle over his wrists, past ninety degrees, he would be forced to let go or risk face-planting on the floor like the back end of a teeter-totter. But how would she accomplish this? His hold on her was firm.

Hannah looked down at his hips straddling her waist. His knees were planted to the ground, but his hind legs were hooked around her calves. There was nothing other than his hands, keeping him balanced. She thought back to the teeter-totter analogy. This was her way out.

Ureka!

With speed she didn’t know she was capable of Hannah rammed her torso up as far as it would go, bridging her hips, and violently swooped her hands downwards like a snow angel. She barely caught the excited glint in Satoru’s blue eyes at her discovering the loophole. Like she predicted, he fell face forward from the momentum, having no choice but to release her hands to prevent eating the floor, however, Hannah got ahead of herself. See, what she was supposed to do in this instance was hug his torso like a tree, grab his shoulder, lock the arm, and roll. And so having forgotten those four additional steps, she instead tried scrambling out from under him. Big mistake. Without locking his arm, there was nothing blocking it from the rebound. Satoru miscalculated her move…

And elbowed her straight in the nose like a sledgehammer.

CR-ACK!!

It was a heart rendering sound. Satoru could feel and hear the fracturing of bone as though it were porcelain china.

The smirk on his face vanished completely.

“Oh shit, I didn’t think you’d — Fuck, Hannah, are you alright?”

Stupid of him to ask really. Even the densest simpleton could see her nose was broken. Hannah tasted iron on her tongue. The world was an explosion of stars. Every pinch of her eyes stung. She had taken a direct hit. The cartilage was bent out of line and swelling heavily, bruised purple and red, blood oozing out both nostrils. He didn’t have to use his Six Eyes to know it was horrible. So much for creativity.

“Quick, use this.” Satoru raised his arms and without a moment’s hesitation peeled off his shirt. Cradling the base of her neck, he then tilted her head down, and shoved the wadded shirt to her nose. “Put pressure on it.”

Hannah held the sweaty shirt. Her swollen nasal passages might’ve been clogged with blood, but she still managed to catch remnants of incense and Italian-roast coffee saturated in the cotton; two scents that shouldn’t go together and yet did. The dampened shirt didn’t smell bad as one would imagine, mixed with his sweat and body odor, but rather soothingly pleasant and masculine. So him. Like honeysuckle to an insect, she found it near impossible to resist, closing her eyes and slowly inhaling as much incense and coffee as she could, wanting more. The pressure and pain seemed to gradually subside until she felt something like fingers tilt her chin at the floor again, readjusting the shirt in her hands that was surely covered in blood.

“Gotta keep your head down, Hannah. No looking up.”

Whether it had been deliberate or not, he had given her a clear, perfect view. Hannah had never seen him shirtless before. The strange tingling sensation gripped her body like a vise, and the blood rushing from her nostrils felt as though it were pumping back up her nose to her cranium. He was handsome in a near-painful way. Her eyes traced the breadth of his broad shoulders, to his veiny toned biceps and smooth sculpted chest. Years of training and strict discipline edged in every contour of his musculature, from his trapezoids down to his six-pack, unblemished skin coated in a thin sheen of sweat, no obvious signs of excess body fat to be had. Adonis. Masculine. Ravishing.

How long did it take him to achieve such a physique, she wondered. Perhaps he always had it. Some people have all the luck in that department; height, strength, brains, and dashing good looks.

Her silent appraisal did not go unnoticed.

“Like what you see?”

Hannah's attention snapped from his laughing turquoise blue eyes boring into her. She could feel his chuckle rumble through his chest. It did things to her stomach, turning it into knots.

“It’s alright. You're not the first. I’ll let you off the hook this time.”

“M’not?”

“No.”

“Oh.” There was a lull. “Um…May I ask how many?”

He arched a brow. “How many what?”

Hannah blushed and turned herself away. Trying to extract this bit of information was a thorny subject, the forbidden fruit she was not allowed to eat from. Yet once the inner voice had reached its verdict, there was little point evading the question. “Firsts before me.”

Frowning, his eyes were like blocks of ice. Not angry per say, just guarded.

“Does it matter?”

The quietness returned. She could hear the sound of a bee trapped somewhere against one of the newly installed windows, that familiar buzzing thump on glass. Yes. Yes, it did matter. It mattered to her a great deal not knowing how many lovers had come before her. Satoru rarely divulged anything about his past and judging by his frosty reaction, that wasn’t going to change anytime soon.

He removed the shirt to inspect her nose. His touch was surprisingly gentle as he concentrated, white brows pinched together, biting his lower lip. She suppressed a shiver, feeling his rough calluses graze her cheek.

“Looks like you're not a human spigot anymore,” he said. “Good. Reverse Curse Technique should clear this up in a jiffy.”

Hannah’s eyes widened. “You can do that?”

Her husband’s hubris returned. Slipping her a wink, Satoru gingerly cupped the back of her head. “Hold still,” he hushed, and lifted his spare hand above her face, thinking back to what he learned in his school days: How energy can neither be created, nor destroyed, only converted from one form to the other. First law of thermodynamics. Neat stuff. He felt the negative cursed energy pulse at his fingertips, conducting a positive charge. Felt it mend the contused cartilage and broken bone, decrease the swelling, reattach popped blood vessels, but for some reason he also felt…resistance. Like the moment your quad-core processor suddenly runs at half its initial speed, or how water molecules slow down light. A non life-threatening injury, Hannah’s nose should’ve healed the second the positive energy came into contact with her skin, except it didn’t. It bided its time, stalling. Three minutes in and he still hadn’t fixed her nose.

What the hell?

Satoru stopped for a second, increasing his energerial output. He’d never encountered this problem before. It was like the more he emitted, the more he was met with resistance. Like it wasn’t passing through.

Confused, he glanced over at his wife. She seemed oblivious of the delay, showing no signs of further discomfort, staring up at the ceiling. He went back to the task at hand.

It took him a while longer than usual, but with enough persistence the nose returned as it was. He decided to cheat, just once, and use the Six Eyes ‘x-ray’ vision to assess his handiwork. The purple and red bruising hadn’t completely gone away, although the nasal bone and septum were fully repaired.

“Are we good?”

Believing Shoko would approve of his technique skills, he nodded. “We’re good.”

“Do you want to continue where we left off? I can keep going.”

“Nah,” he said dismissively, taking his bloody shirt from her before standing up. He extended his hand out, hoisting his little wife off the floor. “That’s enough blood loss for one evening. Let’s get some food in you before you pass out.”

She eyed the red splotches on the floor. “What about the tatami? I ruined those too.”

“Leave ‘em be. If they can’t be salvaged, we’ll order new ones.”

The amber sun started to set above the garden lakes. The two placed the table and furniture back where it belonged and headed for the hall. Makoto had dinner ready for them.

The food was delicious as always, three Michelin stars, though Satoru seemed to pester Hannah incessantly about her nose every five minutes. She assured him all was fine and the pain had settled. Upon finishing their meal, the two helped Makoto clean the dishes and put the leftovers in the fridge, and after the last piece of Meissen was hand washed and dried, they thanked the housekeeper for her valiant efforts and let her retire for the evening. Being a Friday night, the couple had nowhere to be tomorrow, so the two chose to stay up a while longer and watch a movie together over ice-cream; plain old Vanilla for Hannah and Triple Chocolate Fudge for Satoru. Satoru had been insisting all week they watch Avatar. They cozied up on the couch with their frozen dairy treats and mentally teleported to the planet of Pandora. The plot was so-so, but the world building was unlike any other. “It looks almost real,” Hannah kept repeating. Satoru agreed. For a five year old movie, the CGI held up nicely.

Three hours later, the film credits rolled. The Six Eyes user stretched his arms out with a yawn. Hannah herself stifled a yawn, signaling it was time for bed.

They continued commenting about the movie as their bedrooms were right around the corner.

“Did you say it made two billion U.S dollars at the box-office?”

Satoru raised a finger. “Two point nine billion.”

Hannah tried doing the money conversion in her head and pulled a sour face. “That’s too much money.”

Satoru chuckled as they faced each other in the hallway right outside their respective rooms.

This was when things got good.

Like two infatuated teenagers standing by their lockers, the couple waited before parting. Satoru had his hands tied behind his back while Hannah was staring bashfully at the floor. They both knew what came next. Since that night facing the smiling Amida statue, husband and wife had been partaking in a new pre-bedtime ritual. Kissing; Nothing quite like the passion (and romance) they shared at Tokyo Tower overlooking the city skyline; A chaste kiss on the cheek. A light peck on the lips. But that was about to change because Satoru was anything if not persistent.

“Can we try…something else?”

Hannah tilted her head in that innocent manner of hers. Satoru had to bite his lower lip to keep from grinning like an idiot, she was so adorable. “Something else?”

“Yeah, something more,” he searched for the word, “substantial.”

His wife's brow narrowed. “I thought we were taking things slow?”

“We are, but this’ll be different.”

“Different? Different how?”

“Just follow my lead.”

“Satoru, I — ”

“Shh.” He held a finger to her lips and spoke tenderly. “I promise you’ll enjoy it.”

Hannah took an apprehensive breath, felt one of his palms frame her cheek, the other hook around her waist, and then came the moment of truth. Satoru’s mouth gently sought hers, but it wasn’t short lived like the others. Far from it. The way he opened her with his tongue was as though her lips were made of smooth butter and he was parsing through them with a hot knife.

Oh, it was a kiss. It really was. Hannah had no experience to fall back on, but she knew Satoru was a good kisser. He had to be. Their previous kisses had been sweet and chaste. This kiss was long and meandering, his satin-like tongue slowly stirring the inside of her mouth like an old-fashioned butter churner. ‘Follow my lead,’ she remembered him saying. Closing her eyes, Hannah began copying his movements. To be honest, she wasn’t exactly sure what she was doing - at least - she thought she wasn’t sure. The wife had been too intoxicated to remember a certain infamous night out, where she might’ve stumbled home drunk at two in the morning and quite possibly flashed him her breasts, before enveloping Satoru in a searing, French kiss. But again, her memory was a blur. It was no use to her now sober, fully aware of how tentative and uncoordinated she was...

Dear God, he tasted wonderful.

Every so often they’d come back up for air, dip their heads, and meet in yet another kiss, just as deep and languid as the last. How long they stood in that hallway, their tongues moving to an unspecified rhythm, taking their sweet time exploring one another, these new uncharted waters, she didn’t know. Satoru was doing most of the work, his left hand wandering up and down her back, while the right got tangled in her hair. The moment seemed to stretch on forever and it became quite hot between them. Hannah thought the flames engulfing her entire body would consume her, a blend of embarrassment, heat, and pleasure. The whimper that came out of her throat was automatic.

Satoru broke away.

“Sorry,” he panted, face slightly flushed from exertion. “Should’ve tapped out sooner.” He cleared his throat, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “So, whaddya think? Fantastic? Amazing? Phenomenal?”

“Good,” Hannah answered, also out of breath. She could think of nothing more to say. “It was good.”

His laugh was disbelieving.

“Actually though?”

She pursed her lips and looked guilty at the floor. Her blush hadn’t gone away. “I guess some more practice couldn’t hurt.”

Satoru grinned at the invitation.

“Practice, hmm?” There was a knowing glint in his eyes he couldn’t hide. “Maybe we’ll add it to your training schedule.”

He watched his wife shyly peer up at him. A smile crept at the edges of her kissed lips. Lips kissed by him. Her eyes were so hazel, so warm, empty of everything that wasn’t just the two of them. “I wouldn’t be against that.”

The Six Eyes wielder could’ve danced a jig up and down the hallway, playing every bit the love-struck imbecile he knew himself to be.

It was the tiny victories in life.

Chapter Contents

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