We spent the day doing nothing, but somehow time passed quickly. The nurse was right when she said we would be exhausted when we returned home. We had given ourselves permission to take the day and night, and begin again tomorrow. Fuji served us the dinner he made and we watched the news on TV together, allowing ourselves to fall asleep together on the couch. It felt like we were just waiting for the night to pass so that we could go into the next day with high hopes.
I woke against a warm body, but the arm around me was unfamiliar. I looked up to see that somehow Fuji and I had ended up laying together, and Aki was absent. A light streaming through the cracked open bathroom door caught my attention, and I padded my way to it. Aki stood at the sink, holding himself up with it, his head down, I imagined because he didn't want to look in the mirror. He was shirtless, his grey track pants low on his hips, and I could see the black waistband of his underwear hugging his skin neatly. His back on his left side was dark blue and purple just like the front of him, dotted here and there with black circles. I was afraid to touch him, but my lips were in line with the tops of his shoulder blades, and I placed a few gentle kisses there.
"I feel so helpless." He said softly. "I'm going to do my best to heal quickly."
I could see his face over his shoulder in the mirror. He was squeezing his eyes shut, and I knew he was trying not to cry. He didn't want me to see him cry, and I suspected he didn't know how a broken nose would react to crying. I placed my hands gently on his back and let my fingertips wander over his skin, careful not to put any pressure on him. His body was tense with pain.
"Aki, no one thinks you're weak." I told him. "Fuji is here to help you because he cares about you, not because he doesn't think you can do it on your own."
He turned suddenly, leaning his back against the wall as he grabbed me in his arms. He pulled me fully against him, not caring at all if it would be painful. "I can't believe this happened." He said. "I'm actually really scared. I tried to act like everything was fine in the hospital and that I was okay with everything, but I'm scared."
"Aki." I spoke his name softly just as an expression of comfort, letting my head rest on his shoulder, tucking my face under his chin. I just wanted to be close to him, to breathe him in. "I'm scared too. But I know you're going to help me, and I'm going to help you too." I felt like he was worried that continuing life from that moment was going to be different, and I felt a looming sense that it would be as well, but I didn't want to give it a name out loud. It felt like it would be too easy to heal and continue on just like normal.
"I should have listened to you." He continued. "You knew something was wrong, and I should have listened. I'm so sorry."
He reached to hold my face in his hands so he could look at me. I felt my heart pick up speed at his touch, and I closed my eyes in what I realized was anticipation. His hands were gentle, familiar, loving, but they covered the bruises on my face and neck, and my body responded without thinking. I opened my eyes to look at Aki's face, remind myself that I was safe, but he had already seen my subconscious reaction. He didn't back down, recognizing what he saw in me, and instead tilted his head so he could kiss me without his nose getting in the way. He kissed me gently, long, until he needed to take a breath.
He hung his arms loosely around my hips, and nodded in acknowledgement. "I was also scared that there would be a lot of that." He was referring to my reaction when he first placed his hands on my face. We had both recognized that the reaction came from a place of remembering the trauma of the attack. "Tell me what happened."
I knew that he wanted me to talk about it, to get it out of my head. I had seen most of what happened to him, struggling to get out of the hold of my attacker so I could help him, but he had not seen any of what happened to me. He wanted to know, to make sure I wasn't hiding how hurt I really was. I recalled the night in my mind and described it to him in detail, everything from the events to how I felt. As I retold what I had experienced, I felt the same emotions that I was recalling from that night boiling up in my body. I could barely tell the story to the end before I began to sob, covering my face with my hands as Aki guided me to lean against him with a hand on the back of my head. I had seen everything, but I had also been attacked.
Aki held me against firmly for a long time while I sobbed until I couldn't anymore. My body shuddered hard as I tried to take breaths in between, my hands shook violently. I could barely stand, spending all of my energy with the output of my cries. Aki held me, unmoving, through it all, allowing me to pour it all out over him. Finally, when it stopped, we went to bed, tiptoeing across the apartment. Fuji was still fast asleep on the couch. We didn't bother turning down the bed, getting on top of the covers, and Aki propped himself upright on pillows, just as he had lay in the hospital bed. I rested my head atop his thigh and stretched out beside him like a cat.
The smell of coffee woke me, and I couldn't even see the light from the front window brightening the floor outside the bedroom door. Aki was snoring lightly, his head tipped back on the pillows, his mouth open to breathe. I peeked around the bedroom door, met with the orange sunrise pouring in the window.
"Good morning." Fuji strolled out of the kitchen with a cup of coffee in hand. "Did you guys sleep well?"
I nodded and smiled, but my whole face felt swollen from bruising and crying. "We talked a lot, and then went to bed."
"Oh, here. I'll get another." Fuji handed me his cup and went back to the kitchen. "I'm glad you had a chance to talk properly, without being interrupted." He said. He seemed to know exactly what I meant when I said 'talked', even as I left out the details. "I hope you both got some relief."
I recalled that what had really allowed us to open up to each other was the way I reacted to Aki's touch. It bothered me, that somehow my body's response to the touch of the one I loved was to compare it to a traumatic memory. "I think it will still take some time."
"We'll let Aki sleep as long as he can. The nurse is coming today to take all the stuff out of his nose. Yamada-san is also coming to tell him what's happening with the charges. We'll have to get him out a little after that."
Ueno Park in the afternoon on a Wednesday was quiet. I held Aki's hand as we walked slowly, with hot drinks, wearing spring jackets, Fuji leading the way through the pathways. Aki's spirits had been lifted as the nurse's visit to remove the excess bandaging and stuffing from his nose allowed him to be able to breathe through it. All that remained was a cast glued to the outside. The break was small, on the bridge of his nose just below his eyes, and it had been easy to fix. February had warmed in the few days that we had been inside the hospital, and I felt like it was the beginning of waking from a winter slumber.
"The cherry blossoms will be out soon." Aki said. "Are we going to wear yukata and see them?"
Fuji turned to walk backward so he could talk to us. "It would be nice to have a small outdoor show like the one we did at the Geisai."
"It would be nice." Aki said. "But I can barely take a breath, and you want me to sing?"
"You have a couple weeks still." Fuji smiled as if he was giving Aki a challenge, slyly asking if he accepted.
To my surprise, Aki nodded. "All right, challenge accepted. Let's set a date. An acoustic show in yukata under the cherry blossoms. Here?"
"Meiji or Yoyogi would be better. We've already done a show here." Fuji turned as he took his phone out of his pocket, and I knew he was already sending a message to Yamada-san about making arrangements for the show. "You're going to have to work hard to get those ribs healed."
The walk took only thirty minutes, but we didn't cover a lot of ground, Aki walking slowly to prevent too much pain. He went straight to the bedroom when we returned home. "I need to sit down." He said, sounding breathless. I could tell he had been fighting the pain for a while. "Natsu, will you help me?"
I followed him, leaving Fuji to rummage in the kitchen, saying he would prepare lunch. I knelt on the floor at Aki's feet, untying and removing his shoes for him, knowing it would be difficult for him.
"Thank you." He said, patting the bed beside him, inviting me to sit. He reached for the back of my neck, pulling me close to kiss me. "I can kiss you properly again." He smiled lightly.
"What's on your mind?" I asked him, knowing he didn't ask me to go with him into a separate room from Fuji to simply untie his shoes.
"Am I so transparent?" He tried to laugh but it was a task. "I need your help in the shower tonight."
I smiled to myself at the thought of him being embarrassed to ask me such a pleasant favour, but I realized there must have been more to it. "You couldn't ask me that in front of Fuji? Is it such a secret that we do that kind of stuff?"
"Don't be surprised when I try to seduce you looking like this, okay? Just go with it." He took my hand in his, turning his innocent conversation serious. "I think it's important for you. And I think it's important sooner rather than later to get past the trauma of what they did to you. I want to be the person to remind you what it feels like to be truly loved."
"Aki, obviously no one else can do that for me but you."
I was surprised at his suggestion, and a little apprehensive. I hadn't expected him to move forward that quickly, and I hadn't thought that my experience during the attack would change the way I experienced Aki. My reaction the first time he held my face in his hands told a different story though. "Yeah, but what I saw was your body continuing to be on high alert, no matter who it was touching you. I want your body to remember me."
I nodded in understanding, quietly excited by the gentle tone in his voice that I might see yet another side of Aki in the dark. "Are you going to be okay though?" I asked him, as if I had suddenly remembered he was injured.
"The nurse said do everything. I took it she included you in everything."
Fuji packed his overnight bag after eating a meal with us. "Call me if you need anything, but I think you're okay." He said to Aki as he hugged him hard. I could see the pain on Aki's face, but he endured. "I told everyone to give you guys some time, but Kota is dying to come see you."
Aki nodded in understanding. "I'll call him and tell him to come tonight to visit. Thank you for everything Fuji."
"I put the acoustic show in motion with Yamada-san, so you have to be diligent. We also have no doubt that your follow up on Friday is going to be just fine, so we expect you back at the studio on Monday, but we'll see."
"I'll be there." Aki said firmly. "I'm going to do all the breathing exercises and stretching this week. I'll be singing again before the week is done."
Aki walked clumsily into the kitchen. "I'm making tea for the shower since I can actually breathe out of my nose again. I might be able to taste it." I followed him, wondering if the kettle full of water would be too heavy for him, but it seemed that Fuji had already filled it and left it ready before leaving. "And I can smell myself, and it's not good."
I laughed, leaning my head on his shoulder for a moment as reassurance. Aki's scent was a source of comfort for me, whether it was his cologne or his sweat, it didn't matter. "I'll help you so you don't have to try to stretch too much just yet."
He nodded in acknowledgement. "I'll start the stretches and exercises in the morning."