"Look at our hands." Grabbing Doumyoji's wrist, Ido placed the redhead's palm next to his own. "My hands are worn with work. Veiny. Sinewy. Calloused." A smirk caught the man for the first time that day. "Maybe a little gross. Sometimes they bleed. Sometimes they hurt a lot. Some of my knuckles are crooked. Skin breaks, and it's no big deal." He moved on. "Yours. Yours are smooth. Slender, straight fingers. No callouses except for the tip of your trigger finger." A closer look brought a laugh from the older man. "It even looks like you got a manicure." A gentle tease. "What? The Yakuza turn you into a fag?" Doumyoji pulled his hand away and turned from the other man as he shoved his hands into the pockets of his pants, hiking up the blazer that cut against the angles of his body in the process. "What the hell do hands have to do with anything?" But it wasn't the comparison of their hands that left Doumyoji shuddering in its wake -- but the last question that left Ido's lips. The kyodai had killed men before, in the name of the Yamaguchi-gumi, for being publically gay. It was the greatest of all sins -- even worse than betraying a boss, because it was a betrayal of mankind. Doumyoji tried not to think too much about Takeshi, or the fucked up relationship that had grown from broken battlements. "Don't turn away from me." Ido's voice gripped Doumyoji and bitchslapped him, spinning him round on his heels. "What do expensive cars have to do with your job? Fucking whores wherever you please make your dick go soft and your hands turn gay, huh?" A harsh sound erupted from Ido's throat as mucus was cleared. "When I pulled you, your hands were like mine. And I was proud of you. But now?" Ido laughed. "Now... You don't know who you are. So why should I?" Doumyoji stared down at the other man, bristling in fury as he forced himself not to retaliate out of mere habit alone. Had it been any other man but this one who had dealt that blow, he would've been dealing with a dead body instead. "I don't know what the fuck you want from me anymore! You promised me that it'd be five years at most." A pause. "It's been fucking ten years. Ten fucking years! How much longer do I have to do this for?" A voice, harsh with emotion and anger. "You don't know what it's like to see these men who would die for you, who do die for you because you've become their religion. You don't know what it's like to watch men who are supposed to be your brothers, fall before you, just to ensure that their aniki isn't harmed." Thoughts of Takeshi proliferated through his head. "They're men too, just like you and me. They live, they love, they hate, and they bleed just like you and me." "Don't change the focus." Ido barked the words like military orders. A crooked finger pointed at Doumyoji. "It would've been five years if you'd done your job right. It took you how many years to get to a useful standpoint? Six? Six fucking years. Six fucking years before you could do any good at all." Ido sneered. "This isn't about them. This is about your family. This is about who your loyalties go to. This is about the callouses on your hands." Ido lowered his arm. "This is not about your 'brothers', or how many people will die for you." Another racking scrape from Ido's throat. "Don't tell me what I know and don't know. I don't know what it's like to know men who will die for me, huh? I don't know that kind of loyalty?" Ido spat on the ground. "How stupid and senile you must think I am. You don't seem to realize that I'm looking at one right now." A hand reposessed a glossy shoulder. "Sadahige." ***
*** The Yamaguchi-gumi kyodai wondered what the fuck his prize was for going through ten years of the hardest shit he'd ever been put through in his entire life. Did it even fucking matter anymore? Being in the Yakuza was like being infected with a virus; a living, breathing monster that ripped apart resolve and corrupted the finest of judgements. |