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How funny that the fakest person in the room made Eichi feel more real than she had in her entire life. Or maybe she was just as full of shit, and that’s why they were comically, cosmically drawn; like moon and tide, moth and flame, or misery and more misery.
The evening air was less muggy than Japanese summer, but equally searing and thick with the scent of smoke and cement, and a rare July rain that fell over the ocean of roofs and asphalt before Eichi had landed. Her palm was sweaty against the handle of her cane, and she almost regretted forgoing gloves at the risk of seeming old-fashioned. Fortunately, walking through the double doors was like stepping into a freezer.
It felt even more pointless than usual to attend one of these. Especially since she had to make the trip to a different hotel. Especially since she didn’t have to be crushed in the maw of corporate civility and spat out until tomorrow’s executive meeting. But Eichi wasn’t invited, so she had to come.
The conference room was dolled up in silver. The dim light and the crowds of suits and gowns obscured the stains in the carpet that gave away it used to be a casino. The piano portion of Mahler’s Symphony No. 9, alone but robust, waltzed over the indistinct conversation of the party. The young woman in the corner wasn’t playing very well, but the confidence of her fingers and the sternness fixed on her face forced a nostalgic smile onto Eichi’s lips. But only for a moment, because then Keito noticed her presence with poorly restrained horror, and Eichi needed to feign indignation as she was pursued via scurry.
It was difficult not to laugh at her. Black dress like a fitted curtain of inky velvet, merlot lipstick—so risque. Though Eichi supposed Keito in anything but collared shirts and slacks felt risque. She had grown out her hair since the last time Eichi saw her, and the tousles of natural gray between green evoked the image of a mountain forest shrouded in mist. It suited her wonderfully, and Eichi would have complimented her if she hadn’t been pretending to dislike her.
“You…” Keito drew a long inhale and plucked up a glass of champagne from the tray of a passing server. She took two sips then handed it to Eichi, “You weren’t invited.”
Eichi whacked Keito’s knee with her cane and parroted with the edge of a pout, “I wasn’t invited.” Keito was posed to spill a slew of excuses about why Mr. So-and-so was promoted behind Eichi’s back, so she preemptively reassured, “I won’t make a scene. Just going to circle for a bit.”
Keito clearly didn’t believe her, but it was true; Eichi was too exhausted. She extended the champagne flute back to Keito, “I’m not supposed to drink.”
“You’re not supposed to wear heels, either. You’re not supposed to be here at all, and yet—” Keito huffed and half-heartedly gestured towards Eichi. The warm sound of her frustrated sigh eased some of the suffocating tension in Eichi’s chest.
She didn’t speak until Keito was in the middle of her third sip because it would’ve been too painful to watch her reaction to the words. “It’s okay if you give away my job. I’m not going to be around much longer anyway.”
Keito rolled her eyes, but then concerned bewilderment took over her dull expression, and she adjusted her glasses. “I thought you weren’t retiring?”
Oh. Whether it was due to the vertigo of nonstop international travel, another new medication, or simply pieces of herself broken off through the decades, Eichi had recently come to the embarrassing realization that she had been forgetting just who she told. Keito was under enough stress, and only one of them could fashionably afford a heart attack, so Eichi just nodded.
Keito still had that snarky hall monitor glint in her eye, but she looked so mature, recognizable in the myriad of faces but unfamiliar in memory; and that stupid grin tried to creep across Eichi’s mouth again. Before it could, she said goodbye and sauntered through the sea of strangers, known and unknown.
And there she was. If the sight of Keito was disarming, she was nothing less than otherworldly, glowing gently like moonlight but wielding the wrath of the sun in her high posture and veiled smile. By her crow’s feet and the wrinkles at the corners of her mouth, Eichi assumed they were around the same age—early fifties, though maybe the mystery lady was a few years older. Her sleeveless dress was like a wave of diamonds, metallic and sparkling, perfectly coordinated with the scenery. She was adorned with sapphire jewelry, and her lips were painted the same deep blue. Her silvery hair had the same liquid quality as the gown, cascading over her broad shoulders down to her tight waist like pristine spring water. But the first thing Eichi noticed were her eyes, violet and scattered with hues of the rainbow beneath the dappled light. Lively and lonely.
When she caught Eichi’s gaze of persistent curiosity and waved gracefully from afar, Eichi saw she was wearing white silk gloves. She pretended not to notice so she could continue her hunt for the new assistant manager, but then that suddenly awful–
“Eichi! Yes, you, silly goose!”
Eyes magnetized towards her, pointedly not in the way she enjoyed. Eichi conjured a wafer smile, sugary but stretched thin, to hopefully take attention off her murderous gaze. To avoid any further humiliation, she strode over, and her approach was met with surprised satisfaction.
She called over Eichi in Japanese, but her next words were in English. “I wish she’d play Rapsodie espagnole instead.” She sighed dreamily, “That’d be so much more romantic.”
“Have we met?”
In Japanese again, “It’s funny, I’ve always felt like the Impressionist composers knew more about love than the Romantics.”
“Why are you doing that?”
This time—thank god—she didn’t oscillate. “When in Rome,” the infuriating woman shrugged, then regarded Eichi with enigmatic flirtation, “You can clearly keep up.”
All of Eichi’s rage melted into simmering confusion. Eichi didn’t recognize her, neither as an associate nor rival, and she was far too obvious to be a spy. She didn’t have a drink in her hand, and all her breath wafted was hyacinth, so either she was on something or just intrinsically bizarre.
“I just overheard your name and Googled you,” she finally answered with disappointment, fishing her phone from within her hair before replacing it. “You’re a very hot topic tonight. They call you Tenshouin-san, but I like the sound of your name more.”
Intrinsically bizarre it was.
“Who are you?” The question carried more weight than Eichi intended, and the lady visibly basked in the intrigue.
She beckoned Eichi closer despite them being stood in arguably the most private spot in the busy room and revealed behind her cupped palm, “I’m an actress. Wataru.” She pointed out one of Eichi’s junior colleagues who was mingling across the room, “No rule breaking here, I’m his plus one– the wife.”
“Uh-huh,” Eichi raised an eyebrow. Neither the woman he was married to nor his mistress of several years were “Wataru”. Eichi returned her gaze to the stranger’s keenly artificial smile, “What have you starred in?”
Wataru expelled a puff of a laugh that was between apologetic and condescending. “Oh, I do stage plays, you wouldn’t remember my face.”
Eichi dragged a breath and considered the opportunity for a mild escape in this person who was equally unwelcome. A scandal would be tiring, but coordinating another wretched summer night when she was flying back in a matter of days would be even more so. A brief collison any other evening would have ruined the humor of fate, and Eichi had an inclination that Wataru valued the same useless thing.
Eichi hoped the lowness of her voice disguised the rustiness of the words, “I really think I would.”
The luminaries in her eyes flared, and Eichi wished she could have seen it for a little longer before Wataru slipped them shut. Her brow furrowed, and a grin that she was failing to restrain spread across her lips. “Well, the same goes for you. Gorgeous women are my bête noire.”
“Mine, too,” Eichi teased, threatened, and knew when Wataru’s eyes slowly opened and looked straight at her pitiful heart that this would be a mistake for one reason or another. She couldn’t wait.
The moment Eichi managed to break away from Wataru’s mouth in the midst of kicking off their shoes, covertly breathless, she noticed Wataru’s hotel room was a whole other world than her own despite being a mere half hour drive apart. One queen sized bed in the center. A dusty bible in the drawer of the nightstand. An open pack of cigarettes containing a bleak trio on the small table in front of the wall-mounted TV from 2010.
But even three floors lower than Eichi’s luxury suite, beyond the countless flashing lights of Las Vegas nighttime, Wataru had a superior view of the moon. Cold shimmer flowed into the otherwise pitch-black room between the curtains, bathing them in moonglow fractured by shreds of neon light.
Wataru removed her gloves and the array of jewelry that glinted like sparklers in the shadows. Eichi understood why she shed her rings, but not the bracelets or her necklace. She was hoping for the relief of icy metal against her skin.
“You can leave them,” Eichi offered with a carefully neutral expression.
But Wataru shook her head with the click of her tongue. “Guilt jewelry. I don’t want to think about anyone else.” The diamond current reflected a hundred bright, changing colors as it lowered on Wataru’s silhouette like one of the dazzling casino signs outside the glass sliding door. Then it was a puddle on the carpet, and her long body was revealed. “In this moment, I’m only yours.”
Eichi had strategically only stripped her panties, but her resolve eroded when Wataru dipped her head like a swan and whispered into her ear with a decidedly uncharacteristic gentleness. “You good to take this off? It’s okay if not.”
Eichi nodded—suddenly she was good, all of her was as good as humanly possible in Wataru’s arms. The strong, elegant hands that melted into Eichi’s shoulders glided to the small of her back. One pull of a zipper, and Eichi’s blue dress was a dark lake of silk around her ankles.
She sat on the side of the bed as Wataru rummaged for lube in a backpack that occupied a lone armchair. The bed was pristine, despite Wataru’s claim she had been staying for a week, and the sheets were soothingly cool against the fullness of her bare ass.
Over her shoulder, Wataru appraised the nude stranger on her bed, and Eichi tried not to fret over the scars. Most were imperceptible; the ghosts of hernias, organ replacements, and broken bones that never healed on their own left pearly, marbled strokes throughout the canvas of her body. The only one that truly nagged her was her pacemaker. She’d had a new one put in shortly before her trip, and the slight bulge under her collarbone was tender greenish-blue. Nonexistent beneath a high collar and rather minor naked, but even healed, partners’ eyes would sometimes linger before fixating anywhere else as if it was meant to be something uncomfortably ignored, like a crack in the ceiling or a patch of mold in the shower when it was just a battery and wires.
“You’ll have to excuse my stamina.” When the words spilled over Eichi’s lips, and that quiet smile in front of her remained static, she realized they were for her own ease rather than Wataru’s.
Regardless, she was charitably polite, though in a peculiar way that had somehow become familiar in the minutes since they had met. “I’m not as much of a sex kitten as I look, either.” She touched her right knee, which was marred by an aged, rosy wound that was previously concealed by the long hem of her dress, “This one is a bitch, but I refuse to give up ballroom dancing or getting on my knees. Fair warning, however, I’ll be climbing up for ease of access.”
She finally kneeled at Eichi’s feet with no more fanfare than a faint creak. The angle gave Eichi a wonderful view of the arch of sunspots across her chest, the soft curve of her stomach, the low slope of her cleavage and puffy nipples like carnation petals. Eichi blamed the heat in her cheeks on the broiling midnight.
To her horror and delight, Wataru reached up to gently graze the scar above her breast. She winked, “And here I thought I was the cougar.”
Eichi rolled her eyes but snickered. She did her best to match Wataru’s playful tone, but it didn’t flow quite as naturally, “You are, I’m just unlucky.”
“Well, you’ll feel very lucky in just a moment, baby.”
She almost laughed again at the sheer absurdity. The name was foreign and fit poorly, but maybe that was why it sounded so appetizing.
Wataru traced the warm line of Eichi’s thigh with her slick fingertips. She pressed a soft kiss above Eichi’s pussy, leaving a faint, cobalt smudge. Her mesmerizing inflection tickled the blonde curls when she murmured, “About the bad knee– got shot a couple years back.” She chuckled, and the puff of air against the sensitive flesh elicited a shiver. “Sorry, it’s just that some girls find that hot– exciting. I don’t know.”
“What was it like?”
Wataru’s gaze lifted, curiosity so palpable it was nearly disgust at the perceived faux pas. Then a smile curled at the edge of her mouth. Wataru still had her palm across the inside of Eichi’s thigh, barely teasing her outer lips with her thumb, and Eichi regarded her inscrutable smirk with an impatient glare. Wataru acquiesced to the look and rose to her feet. She bit back a wince as she settled onto the bed, then took Eichi into her lap. A mutual shudder ran through them when Wataru’s nipples brushed Eichi’s upper back.
“This alright? I’m more than happy to get back down if you’re not feeling cuddly.”
Sitting between someone’s legs and being wrapped up in their arms was mildly disturbing, but Wataru’s haloed limbs were strong and soft, and Eichi just wanted to get off and forget already. She hummed affirmatively, and finally, Wataru stroked Eichi’s slit with her middle finger. And finally, she parted her inner lips and slipped the digit inside.
With her free hand, Wataru drew circles with the nail of her index finger over Eichi’s knee. “It didn’t hurt immediately. You always think it’d hurt, but it happens too fast to feel anything.” She dug all of her sharp nails into the skin, enough to leave indentations and cause a hiss. “It’s the aftermath that hurts. The realization, the weight of the bullet lodged inside, the healing– that’s what really hurts.”
Eichi nudged her thighs open a little more, a moan buried in her throat, and Wataru added another finger.
“Is it the pain or the end?” Wataru’s timbre was light and sweet like chiffon cake, a stark contrast to the hand that was working Eichi with an equally delectable amount of dexterity and violence.
“The end,” Eichi admitted through a strained exhale, “Pain is just…” The unsaid words were caught up in the warm air, and Wataru watched the knotted letters sail along with an understanding gaze that Eichi would’ve appreciated if her eyes weren’t shut.
The subtly burning hand on Eichi’s knee slowly ran up the expanse of her thigh, the pinch of her waist, the ladder of her ribs—higher and higher—until she kneaded the handful of Eichi’s tit. Wataru groped her with a tight, languid squeeze like crushing dried flowers into powder in her fist. Then the splayed hand became only an index finger nestled into the fullness of her breast. Eichi peeked through one eye at the odd sensation then closed it again with a feeble smile of amusement. Ridiculous. She assumed Wataru got away with most ridiculous things she did. A gun of steel and lead was clearly superior, but admittedly, one improvised of flesh and bone possessed some degree of allure, especially when its wielder was so good with their hands.
“If I shot you here, it’d be over in an instant,” Wataru’s promise was muffled by Eichi’s hair as she nuzzled the crown of her head. Her long digits affectionately raked through the mess of hairspray and sweat before the gun was back. Its fingernail barrel prodded Eichi’s temple, and Wataru added, “Here, too.” She made a popping noise with her lips, and all of Eichi’s muscles tensed so excruciatingly that the air was momentarily knocked out of her. Wataru removed her hand, hot and slippery with the taste of Eichi, then rearranged to brush the blossoming head of Eichi’s clit. Even the light touch was raw and electric, and she tightened around Wataru’s fingers with a small, painful whimper.
The gun trailed down the column of Eichi’s neck, trained on a vein that pulsed, and pulsed, and pulsed. “But here,” Wataru purred, “you’d last longer. More time to bleed and enjoy. Would you prefer that, baby? To feel every nerve alight at once like the most explosive orgasm, then all of it fade away?”
“Yeah, yeah,” The incantation was taut and weightless. Just another palm leaf that swayed outside and licked the stars. Just another futilely lingering rain cloud that shriveled under the ninety degree Fahrenheit moonshine.
Wataru teased her hardened clit with less delicacy, tracing around its edges like the rim of a wine glass or the allusion to a bullet wound. A string of labored cries tumbled from Eichi’s panting mouth. Wataru’s own wet heat against Eichi’s tailbone and the heartbeat hammering against her spine only spun her further undone.
Wataru smothered them by shoving the barrel between Eichi’s parted lips. “Here would be my favorite, though. All that lovely mess.” Wataru sounded equally faraway despite the haze of floral perfume that hung as a wreath around Eichi’s neck. In the dark, with only that voice and that fragrance, and that devastating ache between her folds, Wataru felt intangible; made of magic and danger. When Eichi fucked into Wataru’s hand with wild oblivion, she could almost imagine she was nothing more than a feeling in the air, too. She wrapped her tongue around Wataru’s fingers and sucked eagerly to relish the salt and sugar on Wataru’s hot skin, the fullness in her mouth, the tight weight in her chest as she urged the muzzle down her throat.
The fervent sucking hurt wonderfully and made Eichi gag slightly. She curled her hand around the grip of the gun when Wataru went to retract it. Lovely mess—Eichi was caressed by goose bumps. The blood would trickle down her neck then cross the gulf of her sternum, washing the flank of her tits in crimson before creating rivulets down the valley of herself. Not the pristine, odorless sort in transfusions, but fresh and pungent. The kind of blood that bestowed eternal stains and belonged to the ground. The kind of blood that clung to every trembling crevice and swaddled Eichi in wet and warmth.
Eichi relinquished Wataru’s wrist, and the gun was out of her mouth with a broken retch. Their mouths met cataclysmically. Wataru tasted like nectarine and iron, and the wave of pleasure that wracked Eichi down to the waning marrow of her bones was utterly incandescent, like a star that collapsed in on itself and burst into a billion molten pieces. Eichi poured over Wataru’s hand with gushing pearlescence then suddenly felt grateful to be held.
The world was small again, and the after-party kisses were chaste and candied. Eichi remembered Wataru was probably a person and that she probably was, too. She offered the reflexive apology that she couldn’t reciprocate and had to leave. But Eichi heaved towards the floor while climbing off the bed, and Wataru hooked an arm around her waist once again.
“La petite mort,” Wataru snickered. She said something about a shower and a nightcap, but Eichi’s nerves had fizzled to nothing halfway through the melody of tired syllables.
Golden, variegated light stretched across the room. The cacophony of morning traffic stirred Eichi back to reality. She woke up in bed, naked and alone, and under too many covers. The smell of coffee was carried in the filtered sunshine. The cane that was abandoned by the door now leaned against the bed frame, and the duo of cigarettes sat quietly in their box on the unused dining table. Eichi’s gown waited neatly on a hanger around the bathroom door knob, and a silk sleep shirt and pair of shorts that weren’t hers laid at the foot of bed.
Thankfully, Eichi’s migraine-induced fog somewhat dulled the abject humiliation of an accidental sleepover. The one good thing about spills into unconsciousness was that they made favorable excuses. She could blame the incident on exhaustion and safely avoid some of the bitter taste in Wataru’s mouth when they permanently parted ways.
The curtains were partially drawn, and between the sliver of light that cut through them, Eichi saw her out on the balcony. The formless rage in her eyes was obfuscated by the daylight, but the sun accentuated the hard lines of her face. Wataru’s hair was wrapped up in a towel, and she was wearing nothing more than an oversized t-shirt from some national park. She was scrutinizing the horizon bubbling above the city with a cigarette resting in her mouth. Wataru turned around at the noise of the door squeaking along the track. Her expression softened at the sight of Eichi holding a blanket up to her chest in a perfunctory effort. Now Eichi could make out the design. Bristlecone. Great Basin.
Eichi opened her mouth to give a civil farewell when Wataru divulged, “I put your phone on silent. Thought it’d finally quiet once the sun came up, but that thing was making a racket just a few minutes ago.” She blew smoke in the opposite direction before facing Eichi at her side again. “Does the leader of the profitable world have time for a slice of morning?”
Eichi’s nose wrinkled. “You don’t have to do that.”
“Do what? Act like a normal person?”
Eichi’s eyes took refuge in the open patio door.
“I’m a big girl, Eichi,” Wataru released a fortifying sigh and rolled her eyes. “I’m not trying to…” She shook her head, and it was the first out of the two times Eichi would ever see Wataru fumble her words. “I had a wonderful time. There’s a semi-fresh pot of coffee and a cigarette without my name on it. That’s all.”
Despite the looming dread of an approaching meeting and the far more troubling peripheral hum of the minutiae of small disasters, Eichi would have killed for a cup of stale coffee and a mouthful of sweet ash. Despite everything, she accepted the offer.
Eichi found her phone plugged into a charger. She ignored the litany of missed calls and texts from Keito and less meaningful people and told her reasonably irritated driver to pick her up at the hotel’s back entrance. Eichi slipped into the pajamas. They were far too loose, but they smelled like purple flowers, and the private smile Eichi caught when she joined Wataru on the balcony again justified the decision. After Wataru removed her towel and slung it over her shoulder, she produced a lighter from her damp hair and lit Eichi’s cigarette.
“I think I’m too afraid to ask.”
“A good magician never tells and all that.”
Eichi arched an eyebrow as she took a deep inhale through her pursed lips. “You’re a magician now?”
Wataru shrugged, and the conversation lulled.
Car horns, and screeching tires, and bird chatter filled the silence. The coffee had an astringent, motor oil quality that evoked a painful flicker of nostalgia just like piano, a childhood friend who didn’t like her, and other silly things often did.
“The internet wasn’t very generous,” Wataru ventured.
Eichi scoffed, “I thought you were a big girl.” As if she wouldn’t indulge her and lose the chance to pretend for a few more seconds. “I work in aerospace, among other things.”
“Ah, a warmonger.”
“The word is engineer.”
Wataru hummed noncommittally and took another drag. If she was going to be greedy, surely Eichi deserved the same leniency. “What are you doing here, anyway?” She imagined a gig or maybe another unfortunate soul whose love Wataru could smuggle.
“Killed my husband.”
Eichi chuckled dryly.
Wataru flawlessly maintained the ruse, or whatever the hell was going on. She leaned against the metal railing of the balcony and picked at bits of stucco that were peeling off the barrier wall. Wataru reminisced with reverence but no mourning, “Fourth of July. Not that I needed the diversion.” She dismissed the adjunct by snuffing out the ember of the cigarette butt against the railing, “But I’m glad that night was his last, with all the lights and colors.”
Eichi eyed Wataru with wary amusement, daring her to crack.
“I didn’t take you for a married woman,” the statement had a lilt that molded it into a question.
“No.”
Wataru nodded, “Cheaper than divorce. Insurance didn’t make up for what he did, but it was a nice apology. Not as nice as how his blood felt on my hands, though.” Eichi’s breath hitched ever so slightly, and both of them knew it wasn’t for fear or pain, or any other excuse a normal person could use. Wataru knew, and she exhaled a sudden laugh. “Anywho, it’s easier to hide in noise.”
The moment was delicate, as if time itself was strung up on butterfly wings. Already shattered and slipping between Eichi’s fingers before she could even register. The midsummer air felt all the more stifling, and the caffeine and arsenic churned at the bottom of her stomach like magma that threatened to pour over the side of the balcony.
Eichi swallowed it down and drew one last bracing puff before she crushed the cigarette into the charcoaled remains of Wataru’s. “Can you do it for me?”
“No.”
Wataru’s answer was instantaneous and glass-sharp, and Eichi’s persuasion was equally businesslike. “I’m going to die.”
Wataru merely latched onto her reticence, both a blessing and a curse. A passing police siren wailed below and startled a nearby flock of pigeons, resulting in a commotion of flapping and cooing before the heavy stillness returned and settled. “About a month– cancer.” Before Wataru could try what they all do, charmingly foolish, Eichi enumerated, “Been a few years now. Tried everything. Gave up. Hereditary. Terminal.” She shrugged, amused by the universe’s good sense of humor but still miffed, “Just my fucking luck, honestly.”
“Oh,” is all Wataru uttered. She annotated after a rumbling lull, “I’m sorry.” An even longer pause unfurled, and Wataru’s eventual words held Eichi back by her shoulder as she was about to close the door behind her. “Want to meet up tonight? I’ll bring a real gun this time.”
“You’ll get a call from an unknown number at eight. Don’t pick up until the fourth ring.” Eichi washed out her mouth with sour tap water, pulled on her dress that smelled like last night’s dream, took up her cane, and tried a smile at Wataru from the hotel room doorway. She didn’t linger to see if Wataru smiled back.
The safe house stood in the seclusion of the Mojave desert, amidst endless sand and rock. The building was cubic and sprawling, smooth and tangerine like the sunsets that would bleed into its tall windows. And as the sanguine light fell and the night's spotlight rose, coyotes welcomed the stars with a barking chorus, and a black SUV finally rounded a cluster of Joshua trees.
Wataru managed to look like an entirely different person with a simple wardrobe change. Her hair tumbled down in a braid, and she was wearing an emerald dress with long, flared sleeves—strikingly simple. No sequins. No jewelry. No lipstick. No gloves.
“The color of the grave is green,” Wataru offered, and Eichi realized she had been staring at her impromptu executioner. Wataru pointed a thumb over her shoulder at the retreating car. “Does he know?” It was flippant, but there was a tremor in the undercurrent.
“If he didn’t know, he would have checked you.”
Wataru paled, and Eichi couldn’t help but snort with laughter. “He doesn’t know.”
The only person who did was Eichi’s best lawyer. After Wataru spent a few months in Harare, everything would be just fine. Eichi told herself she crafted a safety net for the stranger so Keito and other underlings wouldn’t face too much trouble, or that it was because logistics had always been her forte, and she refused to allow her final scheme to be anything less than perfection. But the unfortunate fact was that the joy of a master plan was overshadowed by the presence of the woman that was going to end her life.
It was decided they wouldn’t have sex. Across her many ruminations, Eichi had considered the enticement of death in climax. But she hadn’t seen Wataru enough in her natural element as she would’ve liked, if one even existed.
They opened all of the windows, turned off all of the lights except for the side lamps framing the leather sofa in the living room so they were engulfed in a soft glow, and threw Ravel on the record player. The notes bounced off the tile and out of the windows, abandoning them for the night breeze. But the orchestra was sublime when Eichi’s mind was swimming in champagne and Wataru was perched on her lap. Wataru blew rings of smoke that made halos in the small space between them before fitting the last half-cigarette between Eichi’s lips.
Their scene was prepared by the time the first bottle was devoured, and now the necessity for words outside of their second script had passed. There was still the one question, and Eichi supposed it was improper to leave it unanswered even if no one asked.
“I’m never going to be this happy again,” Eichi admitted into Wataru’s ear.
“Well,” Wataru began, then stopped at Eichi’s warning expression. She pulled on the words, “I believe euphoria is the raison d'être, so we’ve made it.” Wataru cuddled up closer and buried her nose in the crook of Eichi’s neck. Eichi watched the dream on the wall, their mingling shadows.
Then it was time. Eichi stripped nude, and when she stepped out into the back patio, it felt like she was wading through a lagoon. She admired the sky, the mountains, the unfolding quiet. Wataru squeezed her hand, and the subsequent kiss was grounding; made of magic, and danger, and sanctuary.
“It’s a delicious night to die, I think.” Wataru’s voice, soft and encompassing, caressed Eichi’s heart and the stars.
“I think so, too.”
The thick arms of cacti stretched out and beckoned, and they made their way a few feet away from the house with glowing windows and no one to listen to the music it shared in favor of moon-soaked darkness and a symphony of crickets. Eichi left her cane.
She lowered to her knees beside a boulder she carved her initials into when she was twelve. The position was intoxicatingly vulnerable and included the added bonus that there’d be less hassle for the team that had to clean up than if she was upright.
Wataru sank her fingers into her hair and revealed a glock. Its black gleamed under the pure, wet light like her earrings had. She leaned over and slowly dragged the muzzle across Eichi’s neck in a ‘U’ shape, starting behind her ear and ending behind the other. Eichi closed her eyes and let herself be guided by Wataru’s cadence.
“Where do you want it, baby?”
“Want– want–” A shaky sigh escaped Eichi’s open mouth when Wataru prodded the cool barrel against the growing heat between her legs. “Want you to kiss me after, so my head. Please.” The anticipation throbbed so intensely that Eichi nearly forgot her line. “What’re you going to do with me?”
“Whatever I want.”
A groan yanked all of the air and desire from Eichi’s lungs, and she waited for the shot. After a few minutes of extended nothingness, Eichi wondered if it had happened. Her eyes fluttered open.
And there she was. Wataru loomed above Eichi with her finger on the trigger.
“Well?”
“Baby, I…” Wataru gave up on the words and begged with a smile. For what, Eichi wasn’t sure. Or maybe the smile was meant to pacify her, and another midnight, maybe it would’ve.
Eichi snatched the gun from Wataru’s hand and shot herself in the head. Her zeal made her sloppy, and the bullet grazed her temple so the blow wasn’t fatal, and instead she bled out across the dirt. But it was okay because she wasn’t alone, and Wataru didn’t scream or anything.
Everything was muddled and floating like she was underwater, but Eichi could faintly feel the warm embrace of the night lap her skin and the tenderness of Wataru’s parted lips when she kissed her.
Dying far away from home beneath a blanket of stars—Wataru must’ve come from those stars, maybe Eichi had, too—and the mercurial gaze of a stranger was the best death Eichi could have ever asked for.
Wataru was right. The pain wasn’t immediate and came in waves as the tide of blood rolled in and out. Wet and warmth. Wataru brushed her fingers through Eichi’s matted hair and rubbed the liquid iron between the pad of her index finger and thumb.
Does it feel nice? Eichi mouthed the question and savored the tang of the stray tear that fell onto the corner of her lip.
It does, Wataru answered, and Eichi got to properly enjoy those crumbling galaxies in her eyes.
Eichi’s fingers twitched, and Wataru took her hand. She smiled again, sad and brilliant, and Eichi felt so deeply safe and loved under its weight that she shut her eyes so the image would be burned into the last fireworks that burst around them.
She heard the distant harmony that rode on the delicate wind through the desert scrub and asked Wataru to waltz along Saturn’s rings.