Epilogue

..::手をとりあって ::..

Akihito looked outside the window with his face resting on the palm of his left hand.

He was crouched against the door of the limousine, his elbow on the armrest, his right hand between his knees.

There was an unnatural silence inside the car: Kirishima was at the wheel, as always quiet and efficient, while Asami was sitting in the back seat next to the photographer. However, ever so far from him.

Akihito followed the drops of rain, which had begun to fall thick and quiet, laying on the glass and then joining one another to form a little stream of water that stretched on the smooth surface of the window and then slipped away and splitted again.

And in the reflection of the window, there was Asami.

The older man had his gaze down on some papers that he was leafing with interest.

The beautiful full lips were slightly opened up by the cigarette poised between them, and the eyelashes were deliciously curved and shadowed those golden eyes, eyes capable of making you shiver with pleasure or fear, with a barely a perceptible glance. Asami's beauty, so manly and ancestral ... at that moment it hurt so much!

But how could someone be so calm after having stuck a bullet into someone's head?

How could someone be so calm?

Akihito raised his right hand to his face, and laid it on his lips, closing his eyes. He did not understand. He did not understand Asami ... but damn, he loved him irreparably!

"I think I will come back ..."

Asami was sitting on the top of his desk, the long muscular legs were overlapped, while the cloud of smoke of the cigarette, tightened between two fingers of his right hand, was dissolving in the air.

The Yakuza narrowed his eyes, to focus on the boy better, moistening his lips.

Hikaru was standing before him. He had a tired expression, as if the weight of his whole life was weighing upon his shoulders. A light dark shade was drawn under his eyes.

"What does that "come back" mean?" asked the Yakuza.

"I think I'm coming back to those days when I was still able to understand what the truth was..."

"I've never lied to you, Hikaru."

"No, you haven't, you have never spared me the truth, including the painful ones, first and foremost the fact that you had never returned my love. That's why, among the things that my father said ..."

"He has never been your father." Asami interrupted him, crushing the cigarette butt into the onyx ashtray, with his usual calm tone, from which, nevertheless, transpired a bitter aftertaste.

"Now he is no longer anything, you have killed him," said Hikaru, without recrimination or irony. A simple observation.

"Exactly," said the older man with flat tone.

"But that man gave an abominable explanation of why you chose me as your ... well, whatever I would have been for you. Not that now this could change something, but you have not said a word against his accusations."

"I'm not used to justifying myself for sins I do not feel guilty for, Hikaru. I give enough credit to your intelligence to think that it is not necessary to say explicitly that those were only nonsense."

Hikaru sighed: "There are things that must be said, Ryuichi-san, even if you think that they are obvious. You cannot always expect that people around you know how to read in your silences, in your absences. You cannot always expect them to have the strength to do that."

Asami looked at him in silence for seconds, minutes.

"Ryuichi-san ... I'm going," Hikaru said then, and approaching the older man, he took off his platinum ring, which shone of cold flashes under the neon.

He took Asami's right hand and laid it in his palm.

"The fact that you have returned the ring to me has no meaning, Hikaru. You are mine."

"Maybe, but with my conditions ...," the pianist said.

Asami looked into the boy's eyes, before he would turn and go toward the door.

On his shirt, there were still the dark stains of Suzuki's blood, and into his eyes, a new determination. Also, the meaning of that 'I'm going' was perfectly clear.

A pleased grin was born on Asami's face. He had always appreciated Hikaru's nerve.

When he reached the door, the pianist turned back to the Yakuza.

"Somehow, I think I will always love you, father."

"I know."

Hikaru smiled. Then he closed the door behind him.

"You better not be so confident, my son ..."

In the waiting room next to Asami's office, Akihito was sitting on an armchair and sipped the boiling tea trying to warm himself, but without success. It was not the cold of the room that gave him that sense of unease, it was a cold that seemed to come from within.

No one could get used to seeing a man dying, not in that way, and he could not get use to living with the fear that the next time that could happen to the one he loved. Maybe he was wrong and could not get used to that world.

Akihito lifted his eyes from his thoughts reflected in the amber liquid he held in his hands, and saw Hikaru's silhouette out in the corridor. The photographer rose from the armchair and called him.

The pianist turned his head and looked at him with an interrogative air, as if he didn't recognize him, but after a few seconds, the pianist give him a forced smile.

Akihito went up to him with a worried expression painted on his face.

"Excuse me, I was a little distracted," Hikaru said, slightly tilting his head to the left.

The light that shone in Akihito's hazel eyes, which were watching him in apprehension, was really heart-warming. Hikaru smiled, this time it was a real, timid smile.

"How are you?" Asked the photographer, almost whispering.

The other boy took Akihito's hand in his owns and replied, "Akihito, please, can you ask me this question tomorrow?"

The photographer seemed embarrassed, and his eyes, avoiding the pianist's, went on the window that separated them from the dark of the night, and Hikaru followed Akihito's gaze toward the city lights.

They remained this way for a little while, until Hikaru let go the other's hand.

"Were you talking with Asami?" the photographer asked then.

"Yes, but now he is looking for you..."

"He asked for me?" Akihito said, slightly amazed that Asami had sent Hikaru to find him, rather than one of his men. Until now, the photographer had always had the impression that Asami would prefer to limit his personal relations with Hikaru to the minimum.

"He never asked, but I know it's this way...," said the other, giving Akihito one of his melting smiles.

The photographer blushed slightly, lowering his gaze.

"Where are you going now, Hikaru?" he asked then.

"I'm going back ...," the pianist whispered.

Akihito was now sitting in Asami's office, accommodated on a leather love seat that occupied the corner of the room that was the farthest from the entry door. Oversized and thick, the love seat was decorated with a curving wood trim across the front. With its rounded back and leather surface, the sofa gave to Akihito the feeling of being in an old Cigar Bar.
The Yakuza was sitting behind his desk, busy in organizing the work for the next day.
As if nothing had happened.
However, Akihito could not concentrate on anything other than the ring that was casually left on the coffee table beside the sofa.
The movement of the hand that held the cigarette, while the Yakuza's other hand was fixed in signing some documents, made the other ring shine from time to time.
Akihito thought, with a touch of bitterness, that although apparently Hikaru had left his ring there, Asami did not intend to take off his.
"You know very well what kind of effect your fearful fawn gaze has on me, don't you, Akihito?"
The photographer wince.
When the hell had Asami moved from the desk to sit beside him on the love seat?
"Asami..."
"My life is not always this way, Akihito ... but often it is."
The photographer blushed slightly and turned his gaze elsewhere. It should not be difficult for Asami to realize that recent events had shocked him almost as well as those that had happened just over a month before in Hong Kong.
"Well, I do not believe to be the only one who is upset, here ... Hikaru has even returned his ring to you!" said the boy, trying to give a half joking tone to his words.
"Exactly. I suppose this ring is cursed. Two people have worn it and one of them is dead, and Hikaru has risked his life twice after having worn it."
Akihito opened his eyes, turning his face toward Asami.
"Two people?"

"Yes... it's a family ring," said the Yakuza, with a bitter smile.

The photographer swallowed, lowering his gaze.

"Are you afraid, Akihito?"
"Yes," said the boy, "but not about what you think ... I'm not scared for my life, I fear... I fear that this damned world would divide us... I fear... I... I do not want to lose you, Asami ...," Akihito said in the end, all in one go, blushing violently and with his eye filled with tears.

"You should have more confidence in my resources, my kawaii Akihito," said the Yakuza in a mocking tone, with the trademark smile shining on his handsome face, and then he gently seized the boy's chin with his right hand, forcing him to turn his face towards him,

"I've already told you to not look at me this way...," Asami said, capturing his lips into a sweet and possessive kiss.
Akihito's first instinct was to wriggle, but then it was his own desire to declare his capitulation: the heat of that body over his, the power and the lust that it released, made the photographer feel like something exploded in the center of his groin to expand all over his body, leaving to the instinct the full control. Their lips continued to devour each other, tasting one another, to join and then deepening their contact, freeing in that kiss a burning passion, while Asami's long and strong fingers caressed that silky skin, slightly wet by the sweat, arousing it at its touch.

Their mouths parted, and Akihito welcomed with a groan the descent of Asami's lips down to his neck, while the older man tasted, licked and bit him.

The boy's breathing grew heavier, turning on the senses, and Asami continued to kiss, lick, bite and suck down to the chest to reach the nipples, making Akihito moan with more strength.

The Yakuza's hands began to be more and more bolder, going to touch the sensitive part of the inner thighs of the boy, which were opened docilely to welcome his touch.

In the silence of the room, the only sound that could be heard was Akihito's pleading voice, as a murmur that was rising up, groaning and calling Asami's name as a prayer. And Asami granted the photographer's wish: with his full and dissolute lips, he slowly descended to the erect and quivering manhood of the boy and laid a kiss on the tip of his member, causing a howl of pleasure to escape from Akihito's lips, and then he raised his gaze to meet the half-closed eyes of the boy, smirking. Without averting his gaze from the other's, he began to pass his tongue throughout the length, slowly, along every inch. Akihito's body trembled in the rapture of the pleasure, but he wanted more, and the Yakuza was very delighted to meet his desires. He entered him with a nerve-racking slowness until, after moments that seemed hours to Akihito, Asami began to move, and everything became deep, hot and uncontrollable, and there was no more rationality, only emotions and senses; a brutal tango, and a crazy beat of the heart, until everything exploded.

Akihito eyelids batted a couple of times, and he tried to recollect his thoughts, that brought him slowly back to reality.
He was still crouched on the love seat, covered by Asami's expensive coat.
The boy seemed to remember that the Yakuza had whispered to him, when he was still half-asleep, that he had to go down to Club Sion to resolve a problem. He stretched lazily, and while lengthening his arms, his finger went on to touch an object lying on the coffee table.
It was an envelope made with expensive paper, with his name on it.
With a slightly trembling hand, the boy opened it. Inside there was only a key. Akihito felt the tears sting his eyes, but this time there was no pain or fear.
That was the key for Asami's penthouse. That was the key for him.

The light that was entering the sliding door of the small veranda cut the room in two: light and dark.
In that late spring's sunset, the sun, which seemed to drip slowly into the deep red sea like a huge golden pearl that was dissolving in a glass of wine, projected long shadows on the world.
The house was small but polished, and laid on the side of a low hill, not far from the extreme outskirts of the city.
In front of the house, a little plot of land, a tiny garden, and in the distance, the sea.
And it was something from which you cannot escape. The sea.
Or at least the man who was standing there, with his hands supported on the railing of the small terrace overlooking the garden, wrapped into a light yukata, would not escape.
Because the sea did not need an explanation, or an apology, or piety, or interpretations.
The sea was.
And that was terribly comforting.
Combing with the tapered fingers the hair that was still wet after his shower, Hikaru thought that in a million places around the world there would probably be houses like that.
Or rather, you could run all over the world and you would probably find that house everywhere.
The same view, the same scent, the same silence, the same colors, the same loneliness.
But this one was special. This was his home.
He was finally back home, the house of his childhood, the only place where he could expect to really understand who he was. And who he would not be anymore. And who he would become.
Since the day of Suzuki's death, a week had almost passed, and it was also almost a week since the last time he had met with FeiLong.
He had asked the Chinese man for a little time, as well. Time to go back.

Now it was evening.
The pianist felt a slight rustle behind him, but he did not move.
"Hikaru ...?"
The moon was hanging in the sky as a white nail that gave too faint a light to be able to illuminate the night, and the sea was only a long and languid noise beyond the darkness.
"Hikaru ...," a voice like velvet.
The wind that blows from the north was fresh and penetrating. The boy shuddereds, but it was not because of the wind. He did not turn around.
"I was afraid that it was only my imagination. I had already smelled your scent, but I have felt it so often these days. And each time, when I turned, I was still alone," He said, turning slowly and gently laying his gaze on the man in front of him. The last yearning of fear that had housed until a few moments earlier in the boy's eyes flew away.
FeiLong welcomed those eyes. That look was the caress of a mother and the blessing of a father, that was the thrill of the skin under the fingers of a lover. That look that payed him back for everything.

And he understood, at that moment, that he would not have done what he had come back for.

Hikaru smiled. An invisible smile, only the corners of those beautiful coral lips moved slightly upward, while he approached FeiLong and get along, heading go to rely on the piano in the center of the tiny livingroom .

Hikaru could not know how the Heaven's angels were, but he certainly knew how the earth's angels were. He was just watching one of them.
"If you will stare to an angel then you will not forget him, and then you would die by nostalgia..."
it was in that room that his stepmother had told him that tale, but now it has become reality, and FeiLong was the fever that, during all that time, had not left him even for one moment.
The light of the moon reflected on the silk's cheongsam and on its whiteness, the long dark hair that the older man let down stood out. Shiny as obsidian wet from the rain, and black as strands tore up from the dark weft of the night, they slipped along the elegant figure of the Chinese man and framed his face.
"I'll die of him ...," the pianist whispered, imperceptibly.
"You asked me for some time, Hikaru ...," FeiLong said, approaching him and standing a few steps away from the boy. Now he was between FeiLong and the piano.
Hikaru nodded and fixed his eyes, liquid gold floating in the darkness of night, on the dark ones of the older man.

"Yes, I asked you for time to think, but what I wanted was to give time to you ..."
FeiLong frowned, astonished.
"I made many mistakes, and because of which I feel ashamed: I stooped to compromise with my conscience to get what I wanted. Thanks to the amnesia, I was able to see all of my weaknesses paraded before my eyes as if it was the film of someone else's life, and therefore, the respect for myself has suffered a grievous blow ..." Hikaru lowered his gaze, biting his lower lip, then continued, "... coming back here, in my house, I understand, however, that it was inevitable. I could do nothing but collect mistakes when I decided to follow my desire for Ryuichi-san, and not because it was self-destructive, or wrong, or amoral, but only because it was false. I wanted Love, and that was not. Only this made this entire drab story something wrong. I thought a lot these past few days, and when I stopped playing blindman's bluff with my fears, I was able to forgive myself. The mistakes I made were just life. The only life possible for people like me. There are people that have made of their every action a diamond: unbreakable, solid and tough: perfect. No false step. No defeat.

People like me do not have diamonds in their pockets, but blown-glass marbles. Fragile, imperfect, transparent. Along our lifetime, a lot of them break, and their fragments leave deep scars.

I thought that being away from me for a while, you would realize if you really ... if you could ...," but the boy had to stop.
The question that would be dissolved by the question he was going to make would open before him the road to the ecstasy, or the road to the void.
"If you could prefer a dirt-cheapglass marble to a diamond. I know you lovedhim, and I thought that you needed time away from me to understand if, instead of a strong and charismatic person as Ryuichi, you really can love someone so, well, so ..." Hikaru lowered his gaze and laid his back on the lid closing the piano keyboard. His head was crowded with adjectives, and they were all so humiliating ... how could he describe himself? He, who in front of the sentiments had no barrier, because he had always chosen not to have one, at the cost of suffering, at the cost of dying for this.
Because of his way to 'feel' he had made Asami his god, and he adored him despite knowing that his love would not be returned.
"But worshipping a god is much easier than loving a man."
And Hikaru could not be content with worshipping that wonderful man that now was standing in front of him, he wanted to love him, he wanted to have him, and he desperately wanted to be loved back. Otherwise, it was better to die by nostalgia.
"Someone so ..."

"So brave?" FeiLong ended the sentence instead of him.
Hikaru opened up his lips to replicate, but then closed them again, bending them in a weak smile.
It was the second time that someone called his weakness "courage".

"Because of my stupidity, you were wounded," the boy said, simply.
FeiLong made a step toward him, and the pianist smelled the other's perfume caressing his skin, even before the tip of the fingers of the older man would brush the inside of his wrists, before falling to stroke the palms of his hands.
"In the little time that life has granted us to be together, Hikaru, I looked into these crystal marbles, and I adored what I saw ...," the older man raised his right hand to touch the pianist's cheek with its back.
The boy skin seemed to burn with fever, and FeiLong heard with delight Hikaru's breath accelerate.
And to think that the reason for which he came there that evening was to give his farewell to him.
In those days of separation, FeiLong reached the conclusion that the best thing for Hikaru would have been to leave the world in which Asami and he lived in. The ranting and raving story of Suzuki hasn't left indifference, even to the Triad Leader.
It was not a coincidence that the happiness of Hikaru had ended just when the putrid-ness of that world in which they moved in encountered the boy's life. Hikaru was generated because of that rot world but, paradoxically, the hand of a man who hated him took him away from it, while the hand of a woman who loved him, put him back in that world, five years ago. His task would have been to pull Hikaru away from that shit. That would mean to let him go.

But ...
But it was exactly Hikaru that had taught him that the desires were a serious matter, and if you betray them, they would turn against you. His desire was there, a few millimeters away from him, and he would not ever betray thisdesire.
He could feel the warmth of his breath, feel the beat of his heart.
And the taste of his lips, in that moment so pleasantly yielding against his.
If he had been a heroic knight, he would have let him go, perhaps making him suffer, but solely in order to save his life.
But he was not a hero, in very truth, he was a ruthless member of the Triad, he was Liu FeiLong, and he would take what he wanted, and he would protect him from all and everyone.
The older man slid his hands along the hips of the boy, and then laid them firmly on his waist.

FeiLong welcomed with delight the thrill of that body in his arms, and the slight touch of those hands among his hair.
The white curve of that delicate neck, while Hikaru let his head drop backward, was nothing but the abandon of the boy to his desire.
"Hikaru …," FeiLong's voice was soft, slightly hoarse. The heat of his breath in the shell of the boy's ear was intoxicating.
"Liu-sama ..." It was difficult even to talk, among those kisses that smelled of amber. It was even too difficult even to think.
"FeiLong. It's FeiLong. Say it... ."
"FeiLong ...," in a breath.
The sea sang through the open window, while the impalpable fabric of the white cheongsam slipped to the ground, and the yukata followed it, which got twisted around the foot of the piano.
The hands of the older man slid from the waist to the hips of the boy, and he lifted him to sit on the lid, which was closed on the keyboard.
Hikaru's feet slipped into the air, losing their contact with the ground, but in that world made only of sensations, the boy did not understand whether that sense of suspension was real or not.
While FeiLong slipped between the young man's legs, his tongue caressed, again and again, the lips of the pianist which, again and again, and again surrendered a thousand times to the older man.
Drops of sweat fell along the boy's back, and long strands of black hair went down to caress the velvet, feverish skin of the pianist, and then lapped the surface of the piano, misted by the heat of their bodies.

The dim light of the moon projected onto the glossy top of the piano the unreal figure of two bodies that were melting. Their whiteness against the shiny black of the instrument was like sea foam floating on the dark waves of the night, and the groans on their lips were tunes of an ancient music.

"Hikaru ..? "
The boy lay nestled against the body of his lover. His head was buried in the curve of FeiLong's neck, his thighs still supported on the older man hips, while his feet swung in the air and his hands were lost in the silky mass of the Chinese man's hair.
"Hikaru, where is the bedroom ...?"
"Hum... No, please, I want to stay here a little bit!" whispered the pianist with a whiny tone, and FeiLong smiled to hear again the whimsical, childish Hikaru.
"As you wish, my love ..."
"I love you…."

FeiLong winced when a feather-like kiss brushed his shoulder.
Hikaru fingers began to move on the muscular back of the older man, fingers that played as if on the keys of the piano, dancing at the sound of silent music, or perhaps to the rhythm of the song of the sea outside the window, which roared down below, in the small bay, down there, behind the curtains in the dark.

On the beach, that night, a man was standing on the seashore, and while the waves caressed his feet, his look sank in the black of night. That sea that he could not see in the dark, seemed almost unreal, an invisible and powerful force beyond the night.
Because of the events that he could not forecast, his life was changed, and he could not do anything about it.

You can't turn back time, just as you can't turn back the tides.

The man risked that his life would end, but he never considered this a big problem.
He had met a pair of very interesting people to "study".
He smiled, but suddenly a very sharp pain struck him like a knife, and if it were not for the dark, someone would see the grimace of pain that blinks for an instant in those deep dark almond-shaped eyes, so in contrast with the blond locks of his hair.

º ¤ ø, ¸ ¸, ø ¤º°`°º¤ ø, ¸ The end (?) ° º ¤ ø, ¸ ¸, ø ¤º°`°º¤ ø, ¸