Aioi:
“Yo.”
He stands by the door and tips his hat with that idiotic grin of his. It’s been a few days since he’s shown himself. Not since that time he darkened that same door looking for a little “Messy Fun”, he’d call it but then started having anxiety attacks no sooner had it gotten started. I smile and wave him inside.
“Welcome back Hajime-han.”
“Oh you’re in a good mood. Not giving me a hard time today?” He asks.
“Now when did I ever?” I bat my eyes coyly like I used to do. I think this is one of those kind of days for him where he’s over compensating for whatever problem happened.
He grins and approaches me. It’s barely the afternoon, an odd time for a visit.
“Would you like some spirits?” I ask him. If he wants it then I know for sure what he came here for.
“No Aioi.” He takes the unlit pipe beside me and lights it up and takes a puff. “I just need a place to rest. You don’t mind do you?”
“Not at all.” I brush his bangs back like I used to whenever he laid his head on my lap. “That’s what I’m here for remember?”
“And the conditions are still?”
“The same. I need nothing and require nothing.” I smile down at him, “I can be whoever you need me to be.”
He reaches up and touches my long hair just like when we were back in Shimabara.
“You’re a good woman.” He tells me me that rarely.
I take something out of my sleeve, a small and delicate feather teaser. Gently I brush the edges of his ear and tickle him softly. He only grins at that as he puffs my pipe. I could ask what’s wrong but I’ve known this one all my life – save for that time right after the two wars but he found me again. I can’t say it was fate that led me to here but that he found me. This man whose wives left him, the good one, the -bad- one, both rejected him he told me one particularly difficult night. And I wonder this non-wife, is she leaving him too? But if she does… I might not have to find my revenge after all.
When he abandoned me in Kyoto and broke his promise to buy me out, I swore I would get my revenge if we meet again. I found myself thrown out of Kyoto, my age working against me and I was relegated to no more than a common prostitute. I couldn’t bear the “loss of grace”, the great Tayu now nothing more than a Juuyo, so I found myself on the streets of Tokyo and no teahouse would admit me. Until one day the man who abandoned me, met me on the street begging for alms for food. “Tayu” he said and I half about ran away.
And then he told me, I could work for him. I asked him confused was it for the police? He said no, just for him. But I needed to go back to what I did best, to the teahouses. He altered my papers (I looked young for my age) and paid for me to get back in as an Oiran higher than a Juuyo so I didn’t have to line up the lattices of a teahouse until picked by some man who doesn’t even ask for your name. I was no longer a Tayu but it was better than living in the streets and it was a profession I knew to do well. And once in a while, he’d pay me a visit just like now. It’s a shame that teahouse burned down this summer.
He stops smoking and closes his eyes. I guess, the feather has made him relaxed? He’s not wanting to ride me. A shame. I wouldn’t have asked for payment, as usual. I let him sleep. I’m sure he’ll leave before the sun goes down.