Without: Crawl Away Side Story

It was November and it was deadly cold in London.  Aoshi looked over to me and pulled the collar of his coat closer around his neck as we waited for our limo to pull up to the curb.  

"I'm sorry that Daddy made you come with me.  I know you hate the cold," he said.  

I shook my head and gathered him to me.   "I wouldn't want to be anywhere else."

He nestled closer to my chest and we waited for a few more minutes before we saw our limo weaving in and out of the airport traffic.  When it arrived, I opened the door for him, let him in, then got in after him.  The limo driver apologized in a heavy Hackney accent as he struggled to pull back into the congested traffic.

"I'd like to go to Saint Paul's Cathedral and listen to the choir boys practice after we check into the hotel," Aoshi said.  

"Of course."

Aoshi had turned seventeen only a few weeks ago, and already he was running a portion of Kanryu's empire.  Kanryu had sent him to this business conference simply because it was necessary,  yet it was dull.  Although Aoshi was capable of handling himself, Kanryu had sent me to watch over him.

"Those business men are sharks," Kanryu told me.  "No personality whatsoever, but they'll try something on my boy. Remind them who he belongs to when they try."

I smiled bitterly and nodded.  Aoshi didn't have to be told why I was with him, he knew.  His father had not left him unattended and without an escort since he was thirteen.  Since that night.  It was a small comfort when Aoshi told me, "I know I don't have my freedom, but I'd rather be with you than him."

Our relationship had been forged almost entirely on forced company.  I didn't mind, although I had to remind myself who I was and who he was often.  I loved him. I loved him more than anything in the world. The fear was always there, however, that I would start to look at Aoshi the way Kanryu looked at him. It wasn't difficult, as Aoshi became older.  He had become an elegant beauty that drew attention whenever he entered a room. He had grown up early and it showed.  The question of "what if" had always plagued me, then I would remember the far-away look of betrayal in his eyes the morning after Kanryu violated him. I would kill myself before I became the person who would hurt him like that, I promised myself.  

After we checked in, we read over our schedule for the next morning and caught a cab to Saint Paul's Cathedral.  The white and crimson gowned choir boys slipped into their places at the circular stand behind the main altar.  We sat in the back, away from most of the tourists.  

"Do you believe there's a God, Ian?" Aoshi asked shortly after the boys began to sing.

"I believe in a greater power than ourselves," I said.  "If that is God, then yes."

He looked as if he wanted to say something, but didn't.  

"Why the sudden interest in the church?" I asked.  "You told me once that you didn't believe in God."

He looked over at me, bright eyes full of life and intelligence.  "Would you believe me if I said it's all about the aesthetics?"

I did not reply.  Aoshi looked back to the choir and leaned against me.

"It's not so much who or what God is," he said.  "It's what the idea of God represents that I am interested in, I think."

"Such as?"

He didn't answer immediately. 

"Innocence, purity and peace.  Things I can only idealize in my mind."

I wound my arm around him and pressed him closer to me.

"The earliest memory of my mother...," he began after a brief silence,  "...might have been like this."

"Being here reminds you of her?"

"Not in the way you mean," he said.  "The things I remember about her...were nothing like what I thought it was suppose to be.  She was often sad, but I never understood why.  Often she cried at night...then that day came."

He paused and curled up tighter against me.

"Before she gave me to the man from the market, she told me she was sorry.  She cried and told me, "I love you too much to lose you to him".  Then she asked for my forgiveness.  It was something that stayed in my mind, but I never tried to understand it.  It wasn't until I was about ten, I asked Frankie to look into my background as a personal favor.  He told me my mother committed suicide a few months after I was sent away.  And he gave me a picture of my father--then I finally understood why my mother was always sad when she looked at me."

He looked up at me.  "I looked exactly like my father," he said.  "I looked like the man who had betrayed her and abandoned her.  A month before I was sold, father had successfully filed for a custody petition to take me back to his home in Japan without her."

"So she sold you to spite him," I said.

"Partly," he said.  "I became her pain and his happiness.  She couldn't live with both."

"Is this why  you were never angry with her?"

"Perhaps," he said.  "Then sometimes I wondered, before I started to look like my father, was mother ever happy?"

I held his hand in mine and we looked forward to the choir boys again.  I did not have an answer for him.  It was an answer that he had to find himself, in the midst of the young beautiful voices that sang about love and peace.  

I took a seat along the side of the conference room against the wall with the other secretaries or bodyguards of the business men.  There's about twenty of them.  Off hand, I recognized eight of them as being in the same league as Kanryu. The others were either legit businessmen or legit  businessmen trying to break into the arms commodity.  I was vaguely amused when the men spoke to Aoshi softly and in an almost loving tone.  Aoshi was by far the youngest member of the board, and I think it was the combination of his Aoshi's unusual beauty and youth that made these men forget he was their equal.  When one of the senior board members tried to assert his authority over Aoshi's, Aoshi leaned back and smiled.  It was the kind of smile he gave before he killed.

"I might be young but I am not stupid," he said quietly.  "You want me to front the entire operation, so you don't have to."

"We are giving you thirty million dollars," the board member said sharply.  "You are a fool to refuse."

"I would be a fool to refuse only if I didn't know about your company's background. Your corporation's failing and has been for years.  This operation will cost at least fifty million dollars, that is if there's no police interference.  So, I would end up fronting at least twenty million excessive cost while you walked away with the returns without a scratch.  This meeting is over.  I will inform my father that we pulling out of this investment."

I smiled proudly and stood as he stood.  There was utter silence as he walked toward the door.  He turned and nodded to the members and told them to have a "Good day", then left.  I walked out behind him.

"Daddy won't be pleased that he lost London in one morning," Aoshi said, as I helped him into his coat. 

"He would be even less pleased whenhe learned that he had lost twenty million dollars and London in a few months."

He shrugged.  "Well, the long, boring meeting's cut short," he said.

We left and returned to the hotel.  There were two messages for us.  Aoshi's message was an invitation to a cocktail party that night, hosted by an associate of Kanryu's who had learned Aoshi was in town.  Mine was a small red card with the faint smell of a familiar perfume.  Aoshi watched me as I opened it and read the message. 

"A lover?" he guessed as he took off his coat and threw it on his bed.

"I guess you could say that," I said, and placed the card in my pocket.  "I used to be engaged to her."

He gave me a curious look and walked over to the closet and slid the door open.  "I never knew you were," he said, as he thumbed through the suits on the hanger.  "Tell me about her?"

I shrugged and walked to the wet bar in the corner.  "There's nothing to tell really," I said.  "I met her when I studied at Oxford.  We dated, lived together and got engaged.  After graduation, I needed to be in Japan and she didn't want to leave England.  So that ended that."

He picked out a black Armani suit and laid it on the bed.  I poured myself a glass of whiskey.

"How did she know you're here?"

"I always make a point to call her when I am in England.  A gesture that I still remember her."

Aoshi took out a freshly pressed white shirt and laid that on top of the black suit.  "And she wants to see you tonight," he guessed.

I shrugged and finished my drink.  I walked back to the bar and poured myself another one.

"Ask her to come and see you then," Aoshi said, as he removed a red tie from the rack and placed it on top of his white shirt.

"I need to be with you."

"I will be fine," he said.  "Daddy knows this man, where I am going.  I am going there to have a couple of drinks and come right back.  You don't have to worry about me."

"But--"

He took his holstered gun from the closet and laid it on top of his clothing.

"I know how to take care of myself, Ian.  I know you are here because Daddy didn't think so...which amuses me because I probably killed more people than you have," he said with a sarcastic smile.  "Be with her tonight."

I said nothing.

"For me," he said. 

I nodded.

Marian came a few minutes after I saw Aoshi off.  She was as beautiful as I'd always remembered her and seeing her again made me feel like I was in love with her all over again.  We went out to dinner and danced to the London Orchestra by the Thames river until it was nearly 1 a.m. 

"Would you consider staying in England with me?" she asked.

I held her closer and kissed her on the forehead.  "I want to," I said.

She looked up at me and the slightest frown appeared. "You want to, but...." she said.

"But I can't," I finished for her.  "My duty's with the Takeda estate.  I love you too much to make you give up your life, to be second to my job."

She sighed and pressed her face against my chest.  "Maybe I love you so much I don't care if I am second to your career, Ian," she said after a while.  

"No," I said.  "You might accept it, but I won't."

She stepped back a little and watched me with a questioning look.  Then she smiled sadly and extended her hand.  "Then how about for just one night?"

I took her hand.  It was an offer I gladly accepted.

When Marian and I returned to the hotel, it was nearly 2 a.m.  I took a quick look into Aoshi's room from the connecting door.  His bed was made and the suit he wore that morning was still lying at the foot of it.  I thought about calling the party and asking someone to send Aoshi home, but Aoshi would probably be angry if I did.  Fairbanks was an old friend of Kanryu's and someone Aoshi had known since he was ten.  He would be fine, I told myself.  I closed the door and turned my attention back to Marian, who watched me carefully from across the room.

"Who were you looking for?"

"Kanryu's son," I said, as I took off my jacket.  "He's why I'm here."

"I'm envious," she said after a while, then stood up and started to take off her dress.  "He has you any time he wants."

I laughed and walked toward her.  "I don't think it's his choice, Marian," I said and kissed her. 

"Do you love me?" she asked suddenly.  

"Yes," I said, and held her closer.  "I always have, and I always will."

Then we didn't need to speak another word. 

I was still awake when I heard Aoshi return to his room.  I looked over at the clock.  It was almost 5 a.m.  A sense of relief came over me.  I carefully extracted myself from Marian's arms and slipped out of bed to check on him.  I opened the door and peered in--he was still in his suit, lying across his bed and asleep.  I walked over and made him sit up. Faint smell of wine came from his breath as he struggled to regain consciousness.

"It's okay," I said.  "Let me take off your jacket and shoes."

He sighed and let me.  I loosened the tie from his neck and took it off.  

"Thank you, Ian," he said, as I tucked him into bed.  "You can be angry with me all you like later.  Good night." 

He closed his eyes and went to sleep instantly.  I laughed softly and kissed him on his forehead.  "Good night," I said.   I watched him for a while before I got up and returned to my own bed.

Marian and I had breakfast in the hotel restaurant before she left.  I checked on Aoshi at 11 a.m., and he was still asleep.  He finally awakened around one.  He looked at the clock, then over to me and slid out of bed.  

"When did I get back last night?" he asked, as he started to strip off his rumpled shirt.  I folded the newspaper and set it down on the desk.

"This morning," I corrected him. "I cancelled our flight for tonight and rescheduled it for tomorrow afternoon.  Your father, thankfully, is in Thailand now."

He nodded and walked into the shower room.  I continued to read the paper until he came out--wrapped in the hotel-issued bathrobe that looked a little big for him. 

"You want lunch?"

He shook his head.  "Drank a little bit too much last night," he said.  "Sorry."

"Maybe I should have been with you," I said. 

He shrugged.  "You scare people off, Ian," he said with a slight smile.  "No one wants to come near me when you're with me."

"And look what happened when I wasn't there to scare off those idiots."

He laughed. "Did you see her?" he asked.

"Yes. She was with me until this morning.  Thank you for allowing me to see her."

"You seem...different...." he said after awhile. 

"How so?"

He didn't answer.  He walked over to the desk, pulled out a chair and sat on the edge of it. 

"Do you love her?"

I nodded.

"So why is she not with you?"

"Because I love her, she can't be with me," I said, and got up to walk to the wet bar to make Aoshi a cup of tea.  "I can't give her what she needs."

"But you love her."

"Love sometimes isn't enough." 

He didn't say anything for a while.  I walked over to him with the hot cup of tea and set it down on the desk beside him.  He looked at it, then back at me.  He touched my face and got up.  I was a little surprised when he kissed me on the mouth.  Startled, I held him away from me.

"Aoshi--," I said.  

"Do you love me, Ian?"

"Of course," I said.  "More than anything in the world...but you shouldn't--"

"I know you know what Kanryu does to me...and he told me he loves me more than anything in the world, too."

I frowned and released him.

"Don't compare me to your father," I said in a controlled tone.  "I would never do that to you."

"Even if I asked?"

"You don't know what you are asking, Aoshi."

He untied his robe and shrugged it off his shoulders.  The white garment pooled around his feet.  It was the first time I had seen him naked.  There was something dangerous and scandalous about his beauty in its true form I couldn't place.  The only thought that came to my mind then was, I must leave.  However, I could not will myself to move.  I stared at him, my eyes fixed on the milky skin still slightly damp from the shower.  Desire swept over me and I found myself wanting to touch him.  I curled my hands into fists and held them hard against my sides.  

"I know exactly what I am asking for, Ian." He opened his arms to me.  "I'd like to know what it's like."

I was confused.

"I want to know what it's like to be loved by a man who really loves me," he said.  "Make love to me like the way you made love to your woman.  Give me that...."

"Aoshi...."

"Please...." he whispered.  I cupped his face and kissed his mouth gently.  That was when I realized it.  I had wanted him like this for years.  A mixture of emotions rose from the pit of my stomach and up to my throat.  The first one I identified was utter disgust with myself.  I pushed him away and stepped back.  He tilted his head slightly and appeared to be amused by my reaction.

"Are you revolted by me?" he asked and stepped forward.  "To be touched by a whore...?"

"Stop it!" I said, a little too loud and too fast.  "Why are you like this?"

He walked over to his bed and picked up a dress shirt draped at the foot of it.  He slipped into it, only buttoning the last few buttons.  The long end of the shirt covered most of him, and suddenly I felt I could breathe again.  

"Last night," he began, as he walked over to the desk to pick up the tea cup, "while you made love to your woman, I was fucking two men I didn't even know."

I drew in a deep breath and held it.  It was not his words that unnerved me.  It was his tone.  It was completely without emotion. 

"Do you resent me for not being there?" I asked quietly.  

He took a sip of the tea and walked over to the window and placed the cup on the sill.  "Maybe," he said.  Then he said nothing more.

"This is not fair," I said, after a long silence passed uneasily between us. "You're asking for something from me that I simply can't give you...."

"What am I asking for, Ian?" he asked softly.  "To know what it's like to be with someone who can love me and not hurt me?"

I drew in another deep breath and suddenly I remembered the first day I saw him.  I remembered his eyes as he glanced over to me when I came into the main hall to meet him.  "Those eyes don't belong to a six-year old child....' That was my first thought as I crouched down to speak to the boy.  His eyes told me he had long lost his innocence and childhood.  I think it was at that moment I gave myself over to him.  The unspoken sadness in his voice made me his companion for life when he said his name to me.   

"Aoshi...,"I whispered and walked to him.  He wound his arms around my waist and pressed his head against my chest.

"What if I don't have what you are looking for?" I asked softly, stroking his hair that felt like moist silk.  "What if I am not the one who can bring you the happiness you are looking for?"

"I am not looking for happiness.  The thing I want..." he didn't finish the sentence.  He paused for a few moments before he spoke again.  " I think it was only a few days after I was in the black market after the first man purchased his right to touch me.  My lack of understanding prevented me from feeling much of anything but absolute terror.  That seemed to be the only sensation I can recall from the time I spent in the tiny cage I was kept in.  It was something, at least, that reminded me that I was alive and still human.  Then Kanryu came...."

"Aoshi, you don't have to tell me anything...," I said.  It was strange to hear him speak about his past.  He had always evaded the subject, even when Kanryu asked.  He always replied that he couldn't remember anything.  I could hear the pain in his voice and although I told him he didn't have to say another word, I knew he had to say it.

"That day...when he...hurt me," he said in a broken voice, as if he were carefully choosing the words while the memory passed through his mind.  "The pain that went through me...it was indescribable.  It hurt, Ian.  It hurt so much.... But that was not the most terrible thing.   The worst pain came to me when I realized that I couldn't feel anything anymore.  I wanted to be afraid. I wanted to feel pain, hatred, guilt, weakness, dirtied...anything. But I couldn't feel a damn thing."

I held him tighter.  

"Sometimes, just so I can hear someone tell me they love me, I'll give myself to him.  They are just words, but they are all I have...."

I tilted his face up to look at him.  Slight traces of tears had formed in his eyes.

"You are loved," I said, and kissed him lightly on the mouth.

"Tell me," he whispered and kissed me, then bit my lower lip lightly.

"I love you," I said into his mouth.  "I always have."

We kissed again.  I felt as if I had needed him for years and the sum of my desire had climaxed at this very point.  When our mouths separated, we were gasping for breath.  I licked a trail from his lips down to his chin, then to his throat.  I picked him up and carried him to the bed while he kissed my throat.  I placed him on the bed and straddled him.  He unbuttoned my shirt and kissed my chest.  I came to the realization that I could no longer remember the child Aoshi I had raised.  The only Aoshi that existed at that moment was the young lover lying beneath me.  

"I love you," I whispered, stroking his hair as his soft lips caressed my belly. 

He raised his legs and hooked them around my waist and drew me closer.  I held him close and we did not move for a while.  I wanted to remember that moment forever.  I wanted to remember how wonderful his warm breath felt against my chest. I wanted to remember how his lithe body felt against mine.  I wanted to remember every thought that passed through my mind, although most of them did not make sense to me.  At that moment our relationship had changed, whether I wanted to stop it or not.  A part of me was reluctant and sad.  Another part of me was hungry and wanted to be fulfilled.  He sighed and writhed a little when my hands moved down to his hips.  I stroked the small of his back with my fingertips.  He ran his teeth along my chest and moaned.

"I want it, Ian....," he said.  "I want all of you."

I traced the cleft of his ass with my my fingertip, the shirt he wore kept me from pressing in.  He moved gracefully and languidly beneath me--a dance that aroused me although my mind was still contemplating if I should have him.  

"I want all of you...inside me...." he whispered.  His fingers moved deftly to unbuckle my belt.  I let him.  I brushed aside his shirt and pushed my finger into him.  He winced and reflexively, he tensed.  I continued to press my finger inside him until it could go no further.  He moaned louder--his voice sweet and sensual.  I moved my fingers in and out of him in long, slow strokes as he grasped at my erection pressing against his belly.  

"How long have you wanted to do this to me?" he asked.  It was a genuine question, the kind where the answer would hold no repercussions.

I added another finger and pushed into him.  He bit down on his lower lip, then let out a deep breath.

"How long have you been wanting to ask me to do this to you?" I replied.  

He ran his fingers along the shaft of my cock and gave me a knowing smile.  "Come inside me," he said finally. 

I withdrew my fingers and raised him slightly over my lap.  He watched me and I watched him, as I pressed the head of my cock against his entrance.  When I applied some pressure, pushing myself in, his mouth opened slightly as if he were in pain.  I stopped.

"No, don't stop," he said.  "I like that kind of pain."

I nodded and continued to push in, applying a little more pressure.  His hands clutched the sheets, wrinkling them in his fists.  He closed his eyes and finally allowed himself to cry out.  

When he was impaled completely, tears started to fall from the corners of his closed eyes.  Interestingly, I did not feel bad.  His tears were quite beautiful and elegant, as they followed a thin trail from his dark lashed lids, disappearing into his damp hair.  

"You are...." Aoshi started to speak.  I remained inside him, not moving until I could feel his body relax and accept my presence.  "...quite bigger than what I am used to...."

I nearly laughed out loud when he said it.  And I knew that if I laughed, I would probably lose my erection and embarrass us both.  I cleared my throat and kissed him lightly on his mouth.

"If I am hurting you, then--"

He opened his eyes.  Bright green eyes , moist with unshed tears, glistened.

"If you stop, I won't forgive you."

"Hai, hai...." I said and kissed him again.  I moved in a very slow, controlled rhythm.  His body was  still very tight, but that could be because he was still young.  

"This feels very nice, Ian...." he said. He slipped his hands beneath my shirt and held onto me.  "I like this...."

I changed the pace a little, the penetration not deep but quicker.  His fingers dug into my back and already, I could feel his nails cutting into my skin. 

"Harder..." he said after a while.  "I want it deeper...."

It was odd to hear those words, yet from him--it almost sounded natural.  I was pumping in and out of him so deep and so fast that I could not tell if  his screams were from pleasure or pain.  At that point, even if he had begged me to stop, I don't think I could have heard him.  I didn't stop until I came.  I emptied into him completely and it took a few moments before  I was able to breathe again.  

We were covered in sweat and still entwined in each other's arms.  A slight pain on my back told me Aoshi had scratched me, and it felt like a long, deep scratch by the feel of the sting.  My trophy or was it his? I thought with mild amusement.  Aoshi nestled closer and seemed to be half-asleep already.  He pressed his face against my chest and finally fell asleep, as I wrapped my arms around him.  I was a wake for awhile, although terribly drained and tired.  I took in the last details of our first affair and marked it in my mind and in my soul.  I wanted to recall the thick scent of our sex and sweat in the air.  I want to recall the sensations of our moist bodies locked in each other.  I wanted to recall the questions that went through my mind then.  

'Will he hate me after he wakes up?' and 'Will he still love me?'

I fell asleep after the answers came to me.  It didn't matter.  Because I still loved him and I would always love him.

I dreamt of the day that I would meet Aoshi again.  Then, I understood why Aoshi didn't have a child's eyes.  They were the eyes of the lover that I had taken that November in London.

~Narcissus