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The first time it happened, it was an accident. At least that was what Kagura liked to believe. They were out of the terminal building, looking at the ruins of whatever was left of Edo when an arm pulled Kagura to the side, behind a big piece of a concrete block.
“We couldn’t save him,” was the only thing she could utter at the moment. Her cheeks were already wet with tears, she couldn’t cry anymore. He wasn’t supposed to be saved, that she knew from the very little conversation they had when they went through the terminal with Shinpachi. But the heavy rock placed on her heart was still there. They had saved countless people together, most of which started as nothing but a simple customer. But when it came to the people that mattered the most to Gintoki, they were nothing but a bunch of failures.
She needed to be strong, she kept reminding herself. Supporting Gintoki should have been the only worry in her heart, she couldn’t even imagine the pain and grief he was feeling.
A tight hug disrupted her, preventing her thoughts from spiraling into her own pit of despair. She looked up, even though the colors of the uniform were familiar. Okita Sougo was hugging her tight, as if his life depended on it. “You’re safe,” he spoke, but it wasn’t aimed at her, she knew. He was only trying to make himself take in the situation, she would let him for the time being. “You’re safe,” he repeated, with one hand on her hair as he pressed her body onto his.
His other hand went to her cheek, and the one that was busy petting her hair moved down to the other. He looked at her, his eyes glistening with the tears he was afraid to set free. He leaned forward.
The taste of the dust raised from ruining a city to the ground mixed with the splutters of blood that she didn’t know whether or not it was his own did not feel nice on his lips. Even proper love was too much to ask during wartime, but she kissed him back anyway. What else were they supposed to do? The crow was gone, the Earth was saved. People weren’t supposed to cry for the villain in this scenario. A big celebration was to follow, a celebration that none of them could bring themself to join, except for the private one Sougo made her feel just a few metres away from the rest of respective groups.
“Sou-chan,” a high-pitched scream distracted her from him. “Have you seen Sou-chan?” A woman continued asking amongst the Shinsengumi officers finally taking a rest behind another giant concrete block. “I can’t find him,” she sounded worried. Kagura opened her eyes, to find him staring back at her, with his face not being able to hide the regret he must have been feeling.
“He was just here,” Kondo answered with a cheerful voice. “He made it out safely, don’t worry, Mayumi-san.”
And Sougo let go of her face, rubbing the back of his hand against his lips to get rid of any possible remnant of Kagura on his body. He looked at her, blinking, then he looked at the direction the sound of a worried woman came from. She didn’t need to be a scientist to realise Mayumi’s dear Sou-chan was the sadist sitting by her.
“It’s fine,” Kagura said as she stood up, patting away the dust of destruction off of her as if it was possible. She needed a new dress altogether, and she needed a new person to direct her clearly misplaced feelings. “Nothing happened here,” she said before walking away from him.
She needed to find Gintoki, he was her priority.
The next time it happened, they were at Kagura’s birthday party, down at Otose’s place. She didn’t want a big one to begin with. Gintoki seemed better, but in his stead, Kagura couldn’t move on easily.
Only the closest were invited, she herself had handed out the invitations she had made in under five minutes, with A6 papers ripped from a Barbie notebook she found in one of the drawers in Yorozuya. It wasn’t hers, but she doubted it could be Gintoki’s either, so it was fine to use, she figured.
And she had made sure to hand none to anyone from Shinsengumi. She wasn’t bitter about a kiss they indulged in, still high on adrenaline from all the fighting, she had justified it in her head the very same day, before even the night fell.
Yet despite not being invited, Sougo appeared at Otose’s door, with a different girl in his arm, another redhead, Kagura had to note, and he greeted them casually.
“This is girlfriend, Kaori,” he introduced her to the small crowd, and as everyone started congratulating the couple of the day, all Kagura wanted to do was continue singing Otsuu-chan’s songs on the karaoke machine with Shinpachi.
It was her party, they weren’t invited, but it changed nothing in the end. “Thank you for coming,” she forced herself to smile. This one, too, wouldn’t last long, she had a feeling.
The only thing that could shut Shinpachi up in the end had been alcohol. His alcohol tolerance wasn’t that high yet, and when his singing started to give Otose a headache (which had already happened by the second song, but Otose was kind enough to ignore it as much as she could for Kagura’s sake), she had found the solution in feeding him rather stronger alcohol than the 2% beer he was drinking the whole night. Otae was at work, that was why he ended up being curled up by Gintoki instead of sleeping soundly in his own bed.
Tsukuyo, too, had odd schedules, just like Otae. She had only stayed until it was acceptable for her to leave, and even then, she hadn’t forgotten to drop her gift, marked with a lot of stickers, all of them telling her to open when she was alone. After dealing with Gintoki’s protective side taking over the whole conversation, the gift was handed to Tama for safekeeping, and she had gone back to the bar, where her neighbourhood friend Kiyoko was waiting for her.
Kiyoko could only stay until she received the warning message she received from her mother, leaving at most an hour after Shinpachi passed out by Gintoki.
With that, they were left alone. Sougo was too busy eating his girlfriend’s face right in front of her, as if he was trying to show her off, and Gintoki, too, was out cold from how much he drank that night. Even Sarutobi had taken this as an opportunity to take as many photos with Gintoki as possible.
“I’m gonna go sleep,” Kagura turned to Tama, ignoring both couples, she had had enough. “You can kick these out,” she pointed towards Gintoki and Shinpachi. She didn’t have any intentions to carry them to their own. Even upstairs seemed too far away at that point, she just wanted to sleep, and be done with this torture that was supposed to be a celebration.
“I forgot to give the gift,” she heard his voice as she closed the door of Otose’s place. It would be the best for everyone for her to ignore him, she knew. His girlfriend was there, with him, yet she couldn’t even bring herself to look at him.
It was just a kiss, it shouldn’t have been a big deal, she reminded herself as she climbed the stairs of Yorozuya. If he had brought his girlfriend there, he must have been trying to give a message to her, yes, she was sure she had everything figured out. He definitely wants to leave the odd atmosphere behind us, she thought as she reached for the door. And he reached for her wrist.
She looked at him, and blinked, looking at his empty hands for the gift he had mentioned before she attempted to run away from him. They were empty.
Instead, he opened the door for her, and guided her in without a word.
Once he himself too stepped into the dark apartment, he closed the door, and wrapped his arms around her.
With this kiss, she knew she couldn’t blame him fully like she did the last time. She had reached for him as much as he had reached for her, and it brought emotions she did not want to deal with at the moment. Jealousy was the biggest of them, followed by regret.
She regretted it as they fell on the ground, unable to even separate from each other for a moment to turn on the lights. What they were doing was beyond shameful, she realised as his hands started exploring her body. His girlfriend was downstairs, waiting for him, yet he was pushing up the skirt of Kagura’s custom-made cheongsam.
His lips moved down to suck on her neck, not even bothering to undress her properly. It was the shame, she reminded herself. They couldn’t have the lights on, they couldn’t get into the bed, and they most certainly couldn’t uncover more than what was absolutely necessary. He was ashamed of this as much as she was, yet neither of them wanted to stop.
The sound of fabric ripping filled her ears as he took her now-ripped panties away from her body. Then she heard the sound of a zipper.
“Happy birthday, China,” he whispered as he buried himself in her. All she could do was to cover her eyes with her inner arm. He didn’t need to see her tears, even though he could hear them through the silent moans, though only for a short while, as he brought his hand to her mouth to silence those after a few thrusts.
This was not how she imagined her first time would be, not on the dirty floor of Yorozuya, the only reason they had her small-scaled birthday party downstairs was that all three of them had been too lazy to clean the whole week, and they couldn’t possibly invite people into the mess they created. His girlfriend was still downstairs, maybe that’s why he’s doing this, she thought. He mustn’t have wanted her to hear or figure it out.
Even if she wanted to submit to the shame quickly overtaking her mind, she couldn’t. She didn’t know how to stop him or herself, when things had already passed the point of no return. It was too late.
“Gin-chan, I want to see fireworks,” Kagura whined as she tried her best to not fall asleep under the kotatsu. It was new year’s eve, and Gintoki had already grown accustomed to being the old man of the house. She didn’t want to enter the new year in her pyjamas, watching stupid game shows he liked to watch when nothing else was interesting enough to keep him awake. Spending two years travelling mostly alone made her appreciate mundane moments more, but this wasn’t one of them.
It took a few more complaints about how boring everything was, and even Umibozu liked to have more fun than he did for Gintoki to finally wake up.
The best firework viewing spot had been declared to be a hill nearby, she had read in the newspaper a few days ago. It already had a nice trail surrounded by forests, and it had the best view of the city. So it was normal for it to be crowded, and it was only normal for him to be there as well.
She didn’t want to raise her expectations this time, but the news of his break up had been the biggest gossip of Kabukicho this past week. With the way he kept coming back to her, she wanted to be hopeful.
Instead, he appeared with another redhead in his arm, as if he was deliberately doing his best to mock her. She couldn’t help but look away as he approached Yorozuya, dragging her with him.
“This is Moe-chan, my girlfriend,” he introduced her, with his eyes focused on her and her only, she had to push herself to greet this innocent girl normally. It had happened only two times, but somehow deep inside her she knew, despite all these women he liked to parade around with, he would still come back to her. She could see right through him, just like how he could see right through her.
“I’ll go find a bench to sit down,” she said to Gintoki, who was leaning against the railings of the viewing spot as he drank the beer he stole from Hasegawa moments ago.
“You wanted to come here, now come stand like everyone else,” Gintoki yelled after her, but she had already disappeared into the small crowd gathered. All of the benches were either taken or covered in vomit, she knew it would be impossible to find a place to sit.
But she appeared to try anyway as she felt a pair of eyes watching her, following her along the small path, to the dark forests surrounding this place. And she knew it had to be him.
She wasn’t trying to make a point, or remind him of their past sins they committed together. In her mind, she was above all that, but she still desperately needed him to follow her, and when he did, that small win she got was enough to fuel her to commit more sins with him.
Just like the last time, they didn’t say a word as they walked away from the crowd. The shame wasn’t quite there yet this time, as she was still high from her small victory. But she wasn’t stupid enough to cause any attention towards their direction.
She turned her back, he was standing right behind her, with his hands in his pockets, and a smile on his lips only helped in annoying her further. She needed to wipe it off of his face, that was the only path she could see in this darkness.
Within a few seconds, the distance between them was closed, and he had pulled her behind the closest tree. His kiss was brief, she found it difficult to consider it a kiss, a few pecks at most. He wasn’t there to satisfy her in any way, he was only there to satisfy himself, and even that almost felt like a courtesy kiss. Too forced, she couldn’t help but wince.
She was not his girlfriend, and when he turned her around, pressing her face into the hard bark of the tree, she realised she would never be. This was not how he treated them, she had had enough opportunities to watch him interact with all his exes, all of which were redheads of her size. He did have a type apparently, and by then, she had already learned she fit into whatever his type was. He just didn’t want her that way, she concluded as he started pulling up her dress, gathering them around her waist.
He chuckled at the lack of panties she was wearing, and with that, the shame in her tried to show itself again. She knew what she was doing when she begged Gintoki to take her here, she knew what she was doing when she chose this long dress, and she knew what she was doing when wandered off to the forest despite him using this small gathering to declare his love for his new girlfriend. She was as much of a horrible person as he was.
He leaned forward to hear that first gasp, and the first few soft moans she couldn’t help but make when he entered. After he was satisfied, his hand found her mouth again as he pulled her body against his. He was only getting rougher with his movements, not caring about the way she moaned, or the tears flowing right onto the hand he was using to drown out her moans. Kagura was too busy thinking if this was how he fucked his girlfriend too.
Then the unorganised sound of the crowd turned into a unified countdown, with a few early fireworks already setting off somewhere closeby, and he came.
He didn’t bother to pull out or help her clean afterwards, he never did, she wasn’t expecting him to.
She ended up missing most of the fireworks that night, and Sougo ran to his girlfriend to not miss the midnight kiss.
Kagura was only shopping for some new clothes when she spotted Sougo, with another redhead in his arm this time. She was happy to see a new one this time, as she had already forgotten the name of the one he introduced to her that night.
His new girlfriend looked a bit different compared to all the girls he dated before. The main difference was the height, it was too easy to spot this time. She looked as tall as him, or maybe even taller if she could stand straight without slouching. And she dressed more modern. Too gyaru, she couldn’t help but think. She was definitely different from the nice countryside girls he had been dating the whole time, especially with her bright red hair.
“China,” he called for her as soon as their eyes met. The girlfriend was right next to him, looking intensely at a piece of skirt.
So he liked to go shopping with them too, she questioned on her own. It was just another thing she would never know how it felt like.
“Sadist,” Kagura spoke, her jaw clenched, and another forced smile on her lips as he dragged his girlfriend towards Kagura.
It had to be intentional, she came to the conclusion. She couldn’t see any other reason why he would pick the redheads, and be this excited to introduce them to her, only to start sneaking around the moment he got a girlfriend. Why couldn’t he move on when they didn’t have any relationship to begin with?
“This is my girlfriend, Momo.”
She had to be polite, she reminded herself. This innocent woman he brought had done nothing wrong to her. If anything, Kagura should have been extra polite and friendly towards her to compensate for making her a cuckquean. It hadn’t happened yet, but she knew it was inevitable. For reasons unknown to Kagura, as they refused to even acknowledge it out loud, Kagura was the only woman Sougo could stay loyal to without showing any desire to make his loyalty known. She knew it wouldn’t take too long for him to come.
“Nice to meet you, Momo-san,” she said with a smile.
Momo, unaware of social boundaries as it appeared to Kagura, hugged her right away. “I heard so much about you,” she exclaimed. “Gorilla always mentions what good friends you two are.”
Kagura patted her back lightly, signaling her to pull away as she made a mental note to kill Kondo when she got the chance. They weren’t good friends, maybe they used to be at one point, Kagura would also like to cling onto those memories like Kondo was doing, but her reality was much more different. If they had been good friends, Sougo would have had the courage to come forward and court her properly instead of fucking her until she cried of shame and pain. She never wanted to be the mistress, but she wasn’t the one seeking him out either.
“I wouldn’t say we’re good friends,” Kagura replied honestly, she had to set the new girlfriend’s expectations straight. She had no intentions to befriend her or Sougo. On the contrary, she wanted to get away from them as much as possible.
“Yes,” Sougo stepped closer, putting his hand on Kagura’s shoulder, “We’re best friends,” he grinned.
Kagura chuckled, and grabbed his hand. He should have expected this when he dared to put his hand on her shoulder, she wasn’t being unreasonably violent when she used the grip she had on him to throw him across the shop with ease, dusting off her hands afterwards.
Momo seemed almost fascinated by what just happened, she grabbed her hands, her face not being able to hide her excitement, she asked, “Let’s meet sometime for coffee, Kagura,” she said. “All his other friends are from Shinsengumi, it’s so nice to finally meet someone normal.”
“No, thanks,” Kagura pulled her hands away.
“That’s her way of saying ‘I’d love to’. She’s a bit tsundere, you have to force yourself in,” Sougo yelled as he sat up.
The only thing Kagura could do in response was to turn her back and walk away. It was not worth arguing, he was only doing it to get onto her nerves, she knew.
“Don’t worry, I’ll break through that hard shell,” she heard Momo say.
This one is going to be a pain in the ass, Kagura found herself mumbling. She wondered how long it would take him to come to her this time.
It was Momo who found her first, or rather cornered, because Kagura certainly felt cornered with how she appeared at the door of Yorozuya, acting as if they had been friends for a long time.
“You only have men around you, Kagura-chan,” she said, with an all-knowing smile on her face, she could see why Sougo had chosen her. She was as arrogant as he was. “You need a little bit of girl talk.”
“I have plenty of girl friends, I don’t need you,” Kagura’s plan of being as nice to her as possible failed before it could even properly start. But it’s mostly her fault, she had already argued within herself and won the argument. But her harsh response somehow wasn’t enough to get her out of Yorozuya.
So for once, Kagura was forced to seek Sougo instead.
“Get your girlfriend off of me,” Kagura said as soon as she entered his office. She had no intentions to stay this time, but he quickly walked up to her, and closed the door she intentionally left open.
“She’s not a dog, I can’t tell her what to do,” he shrugged. Holding her hand so tenderly that it even made Kagura forget he was an adulterer first and foremost, he guided her to his desk.
“She brought all these magazines, solving every single ‘is this the right man for you’ tests, all of which you are miserably failing at by the way,” she continued, ignoring the way he lifted her onto the desk easily. Her hands went to his shoulders for more stability, and continued staying there once he put her down, which he, too, ignored for the sake of their conversation.
“Hmm,” he hummed, pushing himself right between her legs, with his hands on her sides.
“And she asks me why I think you’re failing them. I don’t know what you told her, but I don’t give a fuck about you.”
“But you do,” he smiled. “Why else would you come here?”
“To get rid of her,” she raised her voice, and pulled her hands away. And she realised that she didn’t care whether or not they got caught anymore. With how lucky they had been over the past few months, she had had more than enough time to prepare herself for the downfall of her own reputation.
“She loved you so much, I can’t break her heart like that,” he said as he leaned in. No kisses this time, Kagura noted. He must have enough common sense left in him to not get too romantic when they were discussing his girlfriend. He went to neck straight away, sucking and biting, he also didn’t care whether or not they got caught, she realised at that moment.
“Her heart is going to break anyway after she learns what you’ve been doing behind her back.”
He sighed, letting go of her neck to lift her skirt up, “She’s not going to learn,” he said as he started unbuckling his belt.
Three ex-girlfriends, she counted in her mind as he watched her, and four with Momo. He had four opportunities to choose her instead of whatever redhead he was seeing at the time. And he had consistently chosen everyone but her. He was never going to see her that way, the realisation hit her. She pushed him away, and closed her legs. “What’s your goal?”
“I would like to kill Hijikata one day,” he replied without hesitation. Kagura wanted to laugh at the lengths he was willing to go to not choose her.
“What do you want from me?” she asked instead.
His face fell at her question. He sighed at first, pulling his chair to sit down, then he looked up to her. The lust and all the other superficial emotions she didn’t want to see had completely disappeared from his eyes, instead, he looked bored, annoyed, as if he was bothered by her presence.
“You’re a good lay,” he replied. She waited for him to continue, for him to tell her why he had been chasing her, why he was cheating on all those girls and pretend as if nothing was happening. “I like our system,” he added instead. Of course, she wouldn’t get the answers she wanted out of him. She had been too optimistic.
“We don’t have a system,” she replied. Her argumentative side could have continued if she knew he would listen, but from the very small respect he was showing to her attempts at fixing the situation, she knew he wouldn’t. Her visibly getting frustrated in front of him would only hurt her more in the end, then he would learn she cared.
“What do you want?” Sougo asked. “Do you want me to bring you flowers, take you on dates, and pretend as if I love you just like I did with my exes?”
Yes, I do.
“No, I don’t.” Would it even matter if she was to answer honestly? “What about Momo?” she asked.
He stood up, forcing himself where he used to be barely a few minutes ago. “I think I like her. I can see myself coming home to her and our children in a few years.” He leaned forward, “We could even name one after you if you be nice to her now.”
This time, he went in for a kiss that Kagura knew shouldn’t have happened. In the ideal future he imagined with his girlfriend, she was still nothing more than a mistress.
She broke the kiss, this isn’t worth it, her logical side took over the controls for a brief moment. And her lips moved down instead, going straight to his neck, she bit down hard as Sougo yelped loudly, trying to push her off of him.
It was too late, she couldn’t help but smile as she looked at the dark red print of her teeth sitting right above the collar of his shirt. There was no way he could hide it unless he decided to wear turtlenecks out of nowhere.
“Explain this to her before you can start thinking of your children,” she said as she jumped off his desk.
She hadn’t been the best person to lecture him about loyalty, but she didn’t have a spare life to waste on being his mistress either.
Kagura expected, or rather hoped, that Momo would come to her door, crying about being dumped the very next day. All the logic in her had gone straight out of the window when the night fell, and she couldn’t think anything but him, and them. Momo must have been receiving the affection Kagura couldn’t even see a trace of.
Some nights she wondered what it would be like to be with Sougo, without having to hide from the public or their own feelings. Getting too carried away with them always left a bad taste in her mouth. Even if she had chosen to stay, she wouldn’t be satisfied, she realised.
But it was too late to regret. He had made his choice, and he had chosen to be with her. She didn’t care, at least she tried to appear as if she didn’t care. It was better this way, she would tell herself whenever she felt alone, and he wasn’t there for her. He had never been there for her in the way she needed, she would laugh at her own stupidity, for expecting his loyalty.
She didn’t need him, nor did she miss him. Her suffering from the fall of their weird relationship was supposed to stay in the dark, just like infidelities they committed together. And if he chose to ignore her altogether for the following two months, then it was his decision. The last thing she would do would be chasing him.
After two long months, he was the one appearing at her door. She was alone that day, Gintoki was out drinking, and Shinpachi had been running around the town since morning to organise their next big project for the Otsuu-chan concert that was about to start in fifteen minutes.
“What do you want?”she asked, trying to keep her distance as much as possible. She hadn’t even invited him in, Shinpachi would have loved to scold her for that if he had been there, but she couldn’t. She knew she would give in easily if he was to take even a step inside the building. And he didn’t deserve her sincerity anyway.
“I broke up with Momo,” he said.
“So what? Are you here to introduce the next one?” she asked, and without letting him answer, she continued, “No one’s home now. Come back tomorrow.”
“No,” he said. “I’m here to take you on a proper date.”