Work Text:
“Please come again.”
He delivers his usual line with a wave and a smile, polite with the kind of fabricated warmth that implores his customers to lean in closer and whisper secrets and wishes alike in his ear. Of course, it doesn’t seem fabricated to anyone else—that would defeat the purpose of his accommodating persona. To those who traverse great distances to avail of his services he is Yumeno Gentaro, the luck-bringer with the enchanted tongue, but to the locals in his neighborhood he is simply Yumeno-sensei, ever so happy to help. He fills both roles as easily as tea might occupy a pot, like something shapeless taking a temporary form, graceful as it is transient.
The woman with the previously uncooperative begonia doesn’t look back over her shoulder as she crosses the street, but he knows it’s not out of discourtesy. Her attention is likely focused on the plant she holds in her hands; anyone’s would be, watching near-wilted flowers suddenly regain life after he had told them to bloom.
She’d been the last in line, but he gives the road outside his window another cursory glance before he thinks to call it a night. Empty. He’s in the midst of closing the window when a hand suddenly comes between the panes and a voice exclaims,
“Wait!”
Gentaro raises a brow at the face that pops up from the side, whose wild eyes are illuminated by the lantern hanging above.
“A customer?” he inquires, just to be certain. Wild Eyes nods fervently, an apology rising to his gaze before it filters out of his mouth.
“I saw you closing up shop, but I thought I’d still—”
“Ignore a man’s obvious need for rest, and inflict your will upon him anyway?” It’s not exactly customer-friendly behavior, but there’s something about the way he’s being looked at that strokes the flames of an old bad habit.
“That’s not—” Wild Eyes falters, as expected; vulnerable and gullible, appealing to Gentaro’s amusement and sympathy both.
“A lie. Time can always be made for my loyal clientele.” Gentaro gives him a once-over, pointing out the obvious, “but this is your first visit, no?”
“Yeah!” says Wild Eyes, a little too enthusiastically. As if admonishing himself, he amends, “yeah, but I’ve been wanting to check you out for a while.”
The corner of Gentaro’s mouth lifts. Wild Eyes scrambles, “I meant that in like, a business way. Y’know. Checking out the goods.”
Suppressing a laugh, Gentaro glances at the lantern again. Though not as brightly-lit as it had been when evening fell, it tells him there’s enough of his ability left that he can bless another houseplant, should the necessity rise.
“Then I’m not about to let a new patron pass me by.” His smile is more welcoming, visibly setting Wild Eyes at ease. “Let’s begin with your name.”
“Dice.”
“Pardon?”
“That’s my name.”
“And what can I do for you tonight, Dice?”
Dice holds his arm out, opening his palm to reveal a pair of—
“Your name is Dice,” says Gentaro, slowly, as if to reiterate the ridiculousness of the situation. “And you’d like me to speak fortune upon your dice.”
“You got it,” affirms Dice, with no apparent misgivings. Were Gentaro not staring in complete bafflement, he might see potential in that unwavering baseless confidence. Part of bestowing luck, after all, is believing in one’s own words.
But he’s not in the market for a student, and even if he were, he’d rather have someone who didn’t seem to have a slot machine in place of a brain.
“Alright.” He names his price, and Dice balks.
“That much? I don’t have that much!”
“How unfortunate. I suppose this is the end of our transaction, then.”
“No, please!” Dice clasps his hands together, as if in prayer, as if Gentaro were in any position to play a merciful deity. “I need them to be good to me tonight! Or I’ll be homeless!”
“That is quite dire. But if I gave luck away for free, I’d be homeless as well.”
“I’ll do anything!”
It must be mentioned that Gentaro isn’t as heartless as he’d like to be, and that at this point he’s already feeling moved by the pitiful display, though the hows and whys can be dissected at a later date. Not, he must also emphasize, that he isn’t susceptible to a bit of good-natured amusement.
“Define ‘anything’.”
“Anything!”
“Well, I am in need of an errand boy. Form a contract with me with no less than one pint of your own blood and we can get started.”
“One pint of what !?”
“Is that a deal? I’ll fetch the needle.”
“Hold—hold the fuck—”
“Ah, but that was a lie as well.” Gentaro allows himself an indulgent laugh when Dice gapes at him, though he doesn’t give him room to react—not when Gentaro can wager it’ll just be the same show of wild eyes and distressed accusatory noises. “Though only in part. I really could use an errand boy, if you’re up to the task.”
Dice, to his credit, recovers swiftly, as if he’s realized that his affront weighs significantly less than the bargain Gentaro’s offering.
“So if I agree to do a couple chores for you, you’ll do it?”
“Those are my terms, yes.”
“And there’s no blood involved?”
“Perhaps not just yet.”
“What does—okay, never mind, I don’t wanna know.” Again, Dice holds out his palm, unfolding his fingers to reveal the pair in their midst. “As long as you work your magic, you’ve got yourself a deal.”
Again, Gentaro smiles, lifting Dice’s hand up nearer to his mouth with a delicate touch, and so proceeds to spin a short tale about the prosperous heights the dice could reach, if only they would,
“Roll in your master’s favor, won’t you?”
He straightens up, folding Dice’s fingers back over his palm.
“That’s all?” Dice wants to know. Gentaro nods his assent, prompting Dice to whistle, glancing down at the pair in wonder. “Huh…”
“So, how were they?”
Having been purposely obtuse, Gentaro isn’t surprised when Dice looks at him with confusion, even predicting that such looks might just become the norm from now on.
Slyly, he clarifies, “The goods. How were they?”
It takes everything in him not to laugh once more when Dice flushes crimson, though he’s much too brash to glance away in embarrassment. He stares Gentaro head on, turning redder with every moment.
“Dunno yet. Gotta see how my luck pans out first.”
Not the most ideal response, but Gentaro’s lips quirk up anyway. “Fair enough.”
Dice mirrors the expression tenfold, teeth bared, gaze bright. “Catch you later, Yumeno-sensei.”
He shoves the dice into his pocket when he turns, and there’s something about the sight of him walking away, taking all that brightness with him, that has Gentaro calling out,
“Don’t forget to come back!”
It’s only because of what Dice owes him, he reasons. The heavy objects in his house aren’t bound to lift themselves, and he could use a day off from picking up things from the shops.
It’s only because of that.
Fortune never smiles on the lazy, so it is only a few hours after his last customer has left that Gentaro rises again, falling asleep at dawn and rising with the noontime sun. It’s an unorthodox way to conduct his hours, but it checks out with his less than orthodox business.
There’s not a lot to do pertaining to that, though, given that the lantern—or rather, his luck—still needs to recharge, so he tends to have most of the day free until the line forms outside his window once dusk has showered down. He turns, as one would, to various avenues of entertainment, though he supposes he takes the most solace in books, as a storyteller would. Inspiration for his spells don’t grow on trees, after all.
And when the last pages have been turned on that day’s tome, he finds the pen—or rather, the pen finds him.
Not that what spills out in little flicks of ink is valuable, by any means, but pleasure does not always lie in worthwhile things.
It’s enough to write, even if none if it will be read by another soul.
It’s enough to lose himself in the words, so much that he loses track of the passage of time, and likely would not have found it until evening when he’s interrupted, not quite rudely but abruptly nonetheless, by a knock—not at his window, where a patron might, but at his door.
Someone who doesn’t quite know protocol, then.
Gentaro attends to his visitor, or, as the swing of the door reveals, to Dice, who looks the same as he did during his first visit. Same raggedy coat. Same toothy grin.
“I’m here, Yumeno-sensei!”
Same loud presence, drowning out the static in Gentaro’s head.
“You’re here,” repeats Gentaro, smiling indulgently. “It’s been long enough that I’d begun to think you wouldn’t be.” It’s not a lie, for once; customer feedback usually arrives within a few days of his blessing, but Dice had taken his sweet time. Not that Gentaro is particularly fussed about it either way, of course. “How ever will you make it up to me?”
Dice’s eyes go comically wide. “Wh—I said we got a deal, yeah? I don’t ever go back on my word!”
“And how was I supposed to know, hm? Would you expect honesty out of a stranger with so little to go on?”
“I… sure? Unless they give me a reason otherwise. Makes stuff easier on both of us, y’know?”
The sincerity of it throws Gentaro off, as most things about Dice do. And because he’s in the frame of mind for neither admonishment nor introspection about the implications of Dice’s philosophy, he employs the tried and true Yumeno Gentaro tactic of ignoring inconvenient things.
“That’s more than slightly alarming, but sure. You’ve yet to answer my first question, though.”
Dice’s wide eyes narrow in momentary confusion in response, likely lost in the labyrinth of the nonsense Gentaro had spouted earlier, but he gets there eventually.
“Do I still gotta? I already showed up to do shit for you! What else do you want?”
“Nothing, yet. I suppose I’ll let you know once I’ve thought of something. And on the subject of what you’re actually here for—” Gentaro takes a cursory glance around the room, grateful that he’s more than adept at thinking on his feet. “I need more ink. Fetch me some.”
“Ink? That’s it?”
“Would you prefer a more arduous task? Like, perhaps, gathering the soot for the stone yourself?”
“Forget I said anything. Just ink, yeah?”
“It’s of a particular brand.” Upon retrieving it from his desk, he presses the container into Dice’s palm. “With this packaging. Don’t bother returning if you don’t get exactly this.”
“Scary,” says Dice, completely at odds with his impossible grin. “‘Kay, I’ll be back before you know it!”
And with that he’s off, and it stays that way for a good chunk of the afternoon. Gentaro sits back down to write, but the guilt of sending Dice on a fool’s errand persists and steals the rest of his concentration away—at least, until Dice returns, looking spent but triumphant with the inkstone in hand.
“Told you,” he says, leaning against the doorframe, perhaps to aid his breathlessness. “Back before you know it.”
He offers no qualms about how Gentaro had failed to inform him that the exact brand could only be found in a certain shop in a different part of the neighborhood. He merely stands there, far too proud of his accomplishment to argue or complain, so much that even if it wasn’t his intent, it prompts Gentaro to make an offering of his own.
“Would you like to come in?”
Dice perks up at the suggestion, though his exhaustion gets the better of him again in the next moment. “Is that… I mean, I’m tired, but—“
“I’m only going to ask once, Dice.”
“Oh, then yeah! Yeah. Don’t mind if I do.”
He has enough manners to take off his shoes, but not quite enough to not simply collapse on the floor, in the midst of the room.
Gentaro stares. “I’m hardly a monster. I can provide a futon, if you need to lie down so badly.”
“Nah, I’m good.” Dice yawns, once, as he curls up in what is noticeably a patch of sun. “I’m good right here.”
The staring bears fruit when realization happens upon Gentaro, gaze still affixed on Dice so perfectly content, blanketed only by daylight.
For reasons he can’t surmise, writing becomes less of an ordeal with Dice asleep just a few feet away. He won’t be held accountable for what makes it onto the page for tomorrow’s self to read, reluctantly concluding that his muse settled in just as Dice did.
It would be a terrifying notion, were it not so preposterous. He latches onto the latter, letting the story carry him to far-fetched heights until its starry view bleeds out into reality’s night sky.
Dusk has already made its graceful downwards swoop when Dice wakes, making cursory newly-conscious noises as he regains his bearings. Gentaro, who very much did not continue staring at the sliver of skin between Dice’s shirt and the waistline of his pants, keeps his gaze on the piece of paper in front of him.
“So you’ve made it to the land of the living, Orpheus.”
“Huh?” It’s taking Dice considerably less and less time to acclimate to Gentaro’s sly remarks, letting this one bounce off him when he notices something more pressing. “Hey, what’re you writing?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know.”
“Yeah, it’s why I asked, smartass.”
Gentaro laughs, caught off-guard, though he takes care not to let the shaking of his shoulders result in shaky lettering. “It’s nothing of note. Just something I dabble in when I’m off-duty.”
“So you got hobbies too?”
“My life does not revolve around the whims of my customers.” He sets the pen down, looking pointedly towards Dice. “It’s a job, like anyone else’s.”
“My bad.” Dice’s smile is apologetic, as if internally chastising himself for his slip-up and nearly provoking Gentaro tell him no harm’s been done, but then he laughs to himself, and the sound provokes something entirely different in Gentaro’s chest. “You’re just really good at it, is all. Did I tell you yet that I had a good night at the tables after what you did?”
Despite his own attempts to keep his ego in check, Gentaro swells with pride. As ever, he doesn’t let it show. “Like I said, it’s a job, like—“
“Yeah, but not everyone can do what you do, y’know?”
“Do be careful with your flattery, else my small house might not contain the size of my head.”
“Dunno, you don’t seem like the type to give yourself a lotta credit.”
“Don’t you have to be going?” says Gentaro, in lieu of actually addressing any of that past the sudden heat of his cheeks. Fortunately for him, Dice’s attention span seems as bountiful as his funds, and he pushes himself to his feet in response to the reminder.
“Damn it, I got too comfortable.”
“Right there, on the floor?”
“I’ve slept on worse.” Dice turns sheepish as he begins to head out. “But, uh—sorry for the intrusion! I’ll get out of your hair now.”
“I don’t think you’re sorry at all.”
“Am too!”
“Well, how about repaying me with another errand?” It’s out of Gentaro’s mouth before he can consider what it means, but Dice accepts the notion with ease.
“Guess I do owe you, huh?” says Dice, with one foot out the door. “Alright. I’ll swing by again.”
“Good boy,” says Gentaro, laughing once more at the typical reaction it gets out of Dice. “Have an amazing night at the tables.”
The familiar affront turns to delight, plain as day on Dice’s face, and he’s grinning when he finally takes his leave, raising his hand in acknowledgement when Gentaro shouts, “Don’t forget to come back!”
And then Gentaro closes the door, but not before he’d leaned against it and sighed, watching Dice’s retreating form.
What a nuisance.
It takes a considerably less amount of time for Dice to return, when he next does.
Again, Gentaro was in no way counting the days, but the begonia a happy customer had gifted him did something in the same vein. The flower bud that had been there had barely begun to bloom before Dice is at his doorstep again, knocking on the opened hardwood to announce his arrival.
“Oh, you’re here.” Had Gentaro not been presently preoccupied, his insides might have made more of a fuss, but they’re blessedly quiet with the rest of his body at work. “Come and help me.”
“What’s up?” asks Dice as he walks in, nervous laughter trickling out of him when he’s leveled with a glare. “Woah, you’re cranky.”
“Make an educated guess,” replies Gentaro, gesturing to the rest of the disordered room.
Dice glances around and gingerly offers, “feng shui?”
To his credit, it seems he can always make Gentaro laugh.
“How drastic. I simply want a change of pace.” Gentaro lets go of his bookshelf for a second, catching his breath. “Shall I ask for your assistance again, or will you be so kind as to take a hint?”
“Man, you don’t look so good,” says Dice, apparently and belatedly taking note of Gentaro’s disheveled appearance. “Lemme carry the rest of that, yeah?”
“Please do,” says Gentaro, stepping back with an exhale, his earlier irritability already forgotten. It doesn’t hurt that Dice is receptive to what he needs, he supposes.
“Where’d you want this moved?”
The gall of him to be such a gentleman.
“Just against that wall over there, thank you.”
It’s as Dice is lifting it away from its current position that something small and swift darts out, scurrying between Dice’s feet. It’s a common place to find such a commonplace mouse, but the same can’t be said for Dice’s immediate reaction: his body tense, his eyes wide and trained on the dark shape before it disappears behind another piece of furniture.
It’s not quite fear. It’s more like an interest piqued, reinforcing Gentaro’s realization from Dice’s last visit.
“You gotta get that taken care of,” says Dice, absently. He clarifies, upon coming back to himself, “with all your books and stuff. Don’t wanna get them chewed on and all.”
“I’ll pencil it in. First, I’d like to finish this before dark, if you don’t mind.”
“Ah, yeah.”
Once his breath’s been caught, Gentaro rejoins Dice in rearranging the room, the two of them making quick work of something that would’ve been much harder were it a one-man job. Gentaro’s more than a little grateful when they’re done, and takes care to make it known.
“You can stay, if you’d like,” he says, when they’re both seated. “Make yourself comfortable, free of charge.”
“I think I might,” says Dice, unmoving from his spot even as Gentaro starts to settle in to write. “You writing again?”
“No, I’m performing brain surgery.”
“Ha ha. You can just answer stuff sometimes, y’know, like a normal person.”
Gentaro smirks, though he doesn’t glance away from desk. “I could, but then who would keep you on your toes?”
“Uh, everybody at the gambling dens?”
“Touché.”
Silence tentatively walks in, though Gentaro only gets several lines of his story down before it’s ushered out by Dice’s curiosity.
“That’s a lot of pages.”
“I’m aware.”
“You ever let anybody read any of that?”
“No one’s asked to.”
“Well, would you let me read any of that?”
“Of course, else I’d have just been toiling away in obscurity.”
“Really?”
When Gentaro smirks again, he makes sure Dice can see it. “Is lying that difficult of an art form to master? To answer you, no, I won’t. I’m not writing this for anyone’s eyes in particular. It’s just for passing the time.”
“Fine,” says Dice, surprising Gentaro who, despite not wanting to divulge anything further, had expected him to pry. “Everyone’s got their secrets. I guess this is one of yours.”
“You understand perfectly.”
“I’m smarter than you think.”
Gentaro only laughs, and when silence sits in their midst, this time, it gets to stay. Comfortably, it reclines beside Dice as he dozes and Gentaro resumes writing, and it’s roused only when it’s time for him to go.
“Holy shit,” is Dice’s exclamation after glancing at the clock, his tone not panicked as much as it is incredulous. “You really just let me sleep all afternoon.”
“I had feared you dead, actually. The coroner’s on his way; I suppose I’ll have to call again and disappoint him.”
“... that was a lie, right?”
“How astute. You’re catching on.” The smirk on Gentaro’s lips turns soft, and, disconcertingly, sincere. “I couldn’t in good conscience wake you after all that.”
“Ha, thanks. I think I needed it.”
“I assumed as much.”
“Well, I’m heading out.”
“Don’t forget to—”
They stare at each other then, the silence between them flushed in the cheeks, as Gentaro opens his mouth and closes it again. His usual line can’t very well work here, can it? Dice’s debt to him has been paid, and for all intents and purposes their meetings ought to end here…
“Finish it.”
“Come again?”
“Finish what you were gonna say.” Dice is smiling, ineffably so. “I owe you rent for napping on your floor so often, yeah?”
Gentaro doesn’t bite his lip to prevent his own smile, but he comes close to it. “Don’t forget to come back.”
Dice’s smile widens. “And what else?”
Will Gentaro ever tire of laughing around, because of, for him?
“And don’t you dare lose.”
The signs point to no, as long as Dice answers it with his own.
Nothing about the rest of the night should have been different.
He watches Dice leave, he sets up shop, and he tends to his customers like he always does. He blesses the broken hard drive, the dress tie, the spatula. He bids the last patron goodbye as dawn begins to break, and nothing should have been different.
Not until he looks at the lantern and finds it extinguished.
That’s never happened before.
There hadn’t been more customers than he’s used to; there should’ve been some left over, in case someone turns up late, like Dice had.
Oh, well. It’s a fluke, he tells himself. He’ll just have to be more careful next time.
They fall into a routine, him and Dice, though it might be more accurate to say that routine tripped over them accidentally, then decided to make itself at home. It’s not like clockwork, the way Dice would show up to pay back a favor; the instances are far too erratic for that. It’s closer to a weather forecast, a ninety-five percent chance of rain—Gentaro would glance out the window and wonder, will the sun shine down instead?
Today, the streets are dry. Today, Dice had brought his grin and the promise of granting another of Gentaro’s arbitrary wishes, which was wrapped in the form of a few items left at Gentaro’s house for a more potent blessing.
(There’s a paintbrush for an artist’s lost muse, a pair of shoes for a runner’s upcoming race, and a stuffed animal for a child unused to her ability to see ghosts, all of which Gentaro was paid handsomely for.)
Today, he’d given Dice the addresses for the items’ delivery, and had pretended to write while he waited for Dice’s return. Presumably it all looks the same to Dice, too compliant for how exhausted he seems after playing the impromptu postman. He sprawls out on the floor, graceless, and Gentaro lets his gaze linger a little too long.
Careless.
Later on, he’ll blame this moment of weakness for what he does next.
“Dice.”
“Mm?” Dice peeks at him from the corner of a half-opened eye, alert even in repose, as if ready to answer at Gentaro’s beck and call.
“Would you like to hear a story?”
It takes Dice a second to react, much less reply. He bolts up, then, his tiredness suddenly forgotten. “Really?”
An opening, if there ever was one, to be sincere. But it’s also a way out, if Gentaro wanted it to be, a chance to take it back and say it’s a lie, haven’t you learned your lesson?
“Really.”
Dice lights up like—and Gentaro sighs to realize this—like a lantern, burning bright against an inkspill sky. When things light up like that, it’s hard to refuse them anything.
Had he thought Dice capable of scheming, he’d accuse him of aiming for this all along. But Gentaro knows better, and he’s learned from their routine that that’s not how Dice works. There’s not a lot of forethought in that head of his, most of the space that ought to have been reserved for future planning taken up by a staunch loyalty to what the present has to offer instead.
This is all on Gentaro, who’s patting the space opposite him in an invitation, and perhaps more momentously, inviting someone to witness a side of him that had never been privy to anyone else before.
“So, how are we doing this, sensei?” asks Dice after crawling over, though he maintains a careful distance.
“Your guess is as good as mine. We’re breaking new ground, here.”
“How about something new, then?”
“Getting quite greedy, aren’t we?”
“If you wanna take it that way, sure.”
“Ordinarily I wouldn’t want to encourage that,” says Gentaro, his smile indulgent and his insides tender. “But I suppose I’ll make an exemption. I won’t make any promises in regards to the quality, though.”
“Hey, you won’t hear me complaining.”
Not for the first time, Dice prompts laughter out of him.
For the first time, he tells one of his stories aloud.
Dice, surprising him again, turns out to be an attentive listener, perhaps a perk of living so much in the moment. He interrupts only once, at the climax, all too proud of himself for figuring it out ahead of time.
“It was him! Her betrothed was the bad guy!”
Gentaro rolls his eyes, though his smile is playful. “Nothing gets past you, does it? Great job.”
He reaches out to give Dice a pat on the head with what’s meant to be condescension, but then Dice closes his eyes, nudging the middle of Gentaro’s palm with his nose as if subconsciously, when Gentaro tries to pull his hand back. It’s how he ends up stroking his fingers through Dice’s hair, once, twice, though he doesn’t push for a third time, lest the heat of his face leap out on the tatami floor and set the whole place aflame.
“Thanks,” says Dice when it’s over, devoid of embarrassment, as if he’d never been so content, and there goes another realization to file away with the others.
“Yes, well.” Gentaro clears his throat, hiding his mouth behind his sleeve. “Shall we continue?”
And so they do. Without any interruptions, the story arrives at its intended conclusion, and it ends before Gentaro’s ready for it to.
His fingers are still tingling from Dice’s touch when it’s time for Dice to go.
“There’s something big going on tonight,” explains Dice, as if he’s loathe to leave, too. “And I don’t wanna miss it.”
Miss it , Gentaro almost says.
“How big?” is what comes out instead.
“Huge,” says Dice, to match the width of his grin. “If you bless me real good, I might get you something pretty.”
“Oh, but there’s nothing I want.”
“Aw, come on…”
“A lie. I have been meaning to pull a Scheherazade and get myself a first edition of One Thousand and One Nights .” He’d meant it as a joke, really, but then Dice’s brows knit in confusion, and before Gentaro could say so, he’s already muttering to himself as he stands.
“One thousand and one whats, huh… I guess I’ll keep that in mind.”
“Well then, I beseech you to win big at the tables tonight.”
Over his shoulder, Dice shakes his head, grinning as he steps out the door. “‘Beseech.’ Are you even real.”
A blush rises once more to Gentaro’s skin from the teasing, but it’s pleasant, somehow, rather than entirely mortifying. “Don’t forget to get me something pretty!”
Dice’s ensuing laughter is bottled sake, sweet with a little bit of heat, and Gentaro lets its welcome warmth sit in his gut all night. It occurs to him then that the ache of his cheeks from smiling and that this damnable warmth is nowhere near his normal.
It occurs to him, so belatedly, that he’s happy.
Strange, but he won’t question it just yet.
He’s still drunk on it hours later, and it would’ve stayed that way had the unexpected not happened.
Distracted as he is, he doesn’t notice the lantern dwindling, not until darkness suddenly blankets him and the object he’s in the midst of blessing.
He glances up to confirm his fears, and as his eyes adjust with the moonlight, he gives the lantern a pleading look, as if wishing hard enough might light it up again.
No such luck.
His gaze flickers over to the customer in front of him, and then to the line still standing in bewildered wait.
“I’m dreadfully sorry,” he starts to say, swallowing down the bile that has pooled in his throat. “But I’m afraid that’s all the fortune I can bestow for tonight.”
The woman in front of him stares, expression contorted in doubt, then disdain.
“I traveled several towns to get here, and you’re telling me that’s it?”
“I can only apologize.”
“Am I getting my money back?”
“Yes, of course.” He hands her the bill, or rather, she snatches it from his grasp, along with the golden necklace she’d asked him to multiply. Murmurs spread through the rest of the line, and the warmth Gentaro feels upon hearing their angry questions is no longer pleasant.
“Tomorrow,” says Gentaro, trying to placate them. “I’ll tend to the rest of you tomorrow. If you’ll excuse me—“
He doesn’t close the window quickly enough that an errant remark doesn’t filter in as the crowd disperses.
Yumeno-sensei’s gotten selfish, hasn’t he?
The truth of it paints itself in his mind, stark and ugly.
It’s not false, is it?
He’s happy. He’s too happy. Being around Dice—
Dice.
Win big , he’d said to him. Don’t lose . Have an amazing night.
All of it, far too much fortune spent on a single person. All because he makes Gentaro happy.
He’s gotten selfish.
All his life, he’d been convinced that a gift like his didn’t, and shouldn’t, only be his to bear. Magic so powerful should be shared, or it’ll go to his head.
Gentaro might have a soft spot for Dice, that much can’t be denied anymore, but Yumeno-sensei belongs to other people.
That’s how it’s always been.
That’s how it always should be.
It’s inevitable, that Dice comes back eventually. Gentaro had asked him to, after all.
He’s all smiles upon bounding up to Gentaro’s door, bypassing the knock and the greeting that ought to be customary for visitors, announcing his arrival so comfortably that he might as well have said I’m home.
And Gentaro might have answered, with just as much ease: welcome home , had he not an entire week to weigh the burden on his mind.
This, whatever it is between them, cannot continue. It doesn’t matter that Gentaro has found someone that strikes a match in his chest, if that same someone is responsible for his lantern going out. There’s too much at stake for him to put his own happiness first.
More than Dice being bad for business, it seems he’s bad for the heart as well.
“Sorry,” is what Dice says upon laying eyes on Gentaro. He’s smiling, but there’s an undercurrent to it Gentaro can’t place, until—
Dice takes out something from within his inner coat pocket, but he’s more sheepish than proud when he lifts up the book for Gentaro to see.
“Sorry, that it took so long.” He finishes the thought, and Gentaro realizes that his horror is plain on his face when Dice misinterprets it, wincing. “I kept finding copies, but I had to hunt down an actual first edition, y’know?”
He holds out his arm, beckoning Gentaro to take it with his usual grin.
“Here. One Thousand and One Nights , like I promised.”
Gentaro takes a moment to look at the book, only then taking in what it means that Dice had gone through all that trouble to get it, and another moment to look at Dice himself, drinking in his fill like he might never get to look at him again.
He supposes that’s inevitable, too, once he says what he plans to say.
“I don’t want it.”
“What?”
“Must I always repeat myself for you? I don’t want it.” A lie has never tasted so bitter on his tongue, but he continues before he breaks, “I’d suggested it as a joke, but you always take it too far.”
“Are you—is this a joke, Gentaro?” Dice is laughing, but it’s a pitiful noise, nervous and brittle as he lowers his arm. “What the hell are you saying?”
“I’ve been humoring you all this while, nothing more.” It’s too cruel, even to Gentaro’s own ears, but Dice is stubborn and persistent; cruelty might be all that can keep him at bay. “But you’ve wasted enough of my time.”
“Don’t you need me to—“
“I have no use for you anymore, Dice.”
Dice shakes his head, and Gentaro thinks that if he didn’t have the book in his hands, they might have been curled into fists at his sides. “You don’t mean that.”
“Oh, but I do,” says Gentaro, softly, so soft that the lie is almost unveiled. “Now leave me alone.
“And don’t you dare come back.”
Eternity is what transpires right there, right in his living room, as Dice stares at him, as if trying to find something, anything in his expression that might be contrary to what he’d said.
But Gentaro is too good of a liar. Always has been. Dice, perpetually pointed north and as straightforward as they come, never stood a chance.
Dice exhales, a slow, staggered breath between his parted lips. Gingerly, he sets the book down on the nearest surface, and without saying anything more, heads towards the door.
He doesn’t throw a grin over his shoulder as he goes. Gentaro doesn’t linger on the sight of him as he leaves.
And that’s that.
Everything turns out fine.
In the days that follow his customers return, wary but still in need of his unique services, and he answers them as best as he could hope to. Slowly, he regains his old rapport, and they won’t be calling him selfish anytime soon.
His lantern burns as brightly as it used to, and it lasts throughout the night.
Everything turns out fine.
If he has to run his own errands, do his own heavy lifting, and put his writing to rest, then so be it. If he has to smile without it reaching his eyes, then so be it. If he has to miss someone he has no right to miss—
Everything should be fine. Even the angry customer that shows up a few hours before his operating hours shouldn’t be so monumental, a mere hazard of the job.
“You said it would work,” the man says, jaw tensed and voice raised, attracting the attention of passersby. “You blessed the flowers, didn’t you? So why hasn’t she taken me back?”
“If you would please calm down, I can explain—“
“You fucking better.” The man reaches in to grab him roughly by the front of his haori, practically spitting on him. “Better be a fucking good explanation.”
Gentaro keeps his hands up to seem non-threatening, attempting to keep calm despite the man seeming a moment away from something more violent than a grab.
“Magic can only take someone so far—“
Ah, now he’s done it.
He flinches, bracing himself for the impact of the man’s fist, when he hears growling below them. The man has enough of his bearings gathered to glance down, allowing Gentaro the chance to do the same, at a dog with its canines bared, its eyes locked on the man with his hands on Gentaro.
“What the—“ is as far as the man gets before the dog pounces on him, teeth gnashing between barks, dripping drool on the terrified man’s face. Somehow he’s able to throw the weight of it off him, scrambling to his feet into a run, but the dog is apparently angered enough to give chase.
The two of them disappear into a bend in the road, leaving Gentaro unscathed but shaken, fussed over by those who had witnessed the scene.
“I’m fine,” he says, smoothing his clothes down and smiling his pacifying smile. He withdraws nevertheless, seating himself at his desk and staring down his manuscripts.
He hasn’t written a word down since Dice left—since Gentaro made him leave. Perhaps his inspiration had gone with him, or perhaps he can’t bring himself to grasp at whatever paltry happiness he still had in some pointless show of masochism. Whatever the reason, his stories remain untouched, all of their endings escaping him faster as the days go by.
He takes a pen in hand and draws up a blank sheet of paper, proceeding to stare it down for the better part of an hour.
It’s not like any of this is undeserved.
He gives up, eventually, and goes to set up shop early for lack of anything better to do. It’s as he’s opening the window again that he notices a cat outside, looking at him like it had been waiting for him this whole time.
All the realizations from before had been leading up to this.
Defeated, Gentaro smiles.
“So you’ve come again after all.” He doesn’t expect a reply and he doesn’t get one, as the cat merely continues to stare. “It’s been a while, hasn’t it?”
The cat tilts its head, and Gentaro wants nothing more than to reach out and pat it like he once had, Dice nuzzling into his palm like there had been nowhere else he’d rather be.
“I read it, if you must know. The first edition. Or, I’ve read a few pages or so. I haven’t been able to continue, given the circumstances.”
The cat meows at him. Gentaro sighs, having hoped he wouldn’t have to elaborate.
“You’re wondering what circumstances? Why, me sending you away. What else could it be?”
There’s that familiar bitterness, thick in his mouth as he says those ugly words. I sent you away.
“You know, magic can only take someone so far. If I told you to forgive me—really told you—it wouldn’t mean much, would it? But I’d like you to anyway.”
He inhales, glancing away from the cat’s—from Dice’s—knowing eyes as he exhales, “I’m sorry.”
“Uh, what are you doing?”
Gentaro nearly jumps out of his skin, hearing that voice. That voice that belongs to—
“Dice,” says Gentaro, clearing his throat upon seeing him, right there in the flesh. “Why are you h—“
“You were talking to the cat,” points out Dice, none too tactfully.
Gentaro turns up his nose at the fact. “I was not.”
“I literally just saw you.”
“Perhaps I was talking to myself, and the cat just so happened to be there.”
“Uh-huh. And cherries grow on trees.”
“They do, though.”
“Oh, yeah. Okay, bad example.” Unbelievably, Dice breaks into a little laugh, seemingly despite it all. “You know what I mean, yeah?”
But Gentaro can’t laugh so easily anymore. Embarrassed, and annoyed that he’s embarrassed, as well as a myriad of other emotions fighting each other to come to the surface, he looks away first.
“I thought I made it clear that I wanted you to leave me alone.”
“I know,” says Dice, and the sigh he lets out is small and sad. “But I had to make sure you were okay, after earlier.”
“Earlier?”
“The guy who was hounding you.”
“You heard about it?” Gentaro busies himself with the dust on the windowsill. “I suppose word travels fast in this town.”
“Heard about it? I chased him away, remember?”
“You chased…?” Oh.
“I mean, you knew I was a shifter, right? I figured you didn’t ask ‘cause people think it’s rude and all, but it’s not like I’m the poster boy for politeness.”
“Yes, I knew,” says Gentaro, because he kind of did, even if he was slightly off the mark. But if lying in the sun and getting fixated on small animals hadn’t given Dice away, then the way he had gone after the man in a gesture of protectiveness, then returned to Gentaro, likely against his better judgement, because loyalty took precedence over pride, would’ve done the trick. “But that doesn’t answer the question of why you’re here. Didn’t I tell you not to come back?”
Dice huffs, as if taking offense. “Like anyone can tell me what to do.”
That gets Gentaro’s attention.
The thing is, he hadn’t been telling the entire truth about his blessings. The thing that everyone had been relying on him for—the idea that he’s a harbinger of fortune—was reliant on an elaborate white lie.
Because it’s not luck he’d been gifted with in the first place, but obedience. It just so happened that ordering a begonia to bloom got a close enough result to speaking favor upon it that no one could ever really spot the difference.
All this time, he thought he’d been doing the same to Dice when he’d tell him to come back.
It had never occurred to him, not once, that Dice may have been doing so of his own accord.
“I suppose you’re right.”
“Well,” says Dice, awkwardly scratching at his nape. “I came to make sure you were okay, and you’re okay, and you’re setting up shop now, so I guess I should get going.”
“No,” says Gentaro, without a second thought. He’s done enough thinking, recently. Perhaps it’s time for his heart to take the reins.
Dice looks at him, uncertain.
“No,” continues Gentaro, more sure than he’s ever been of anything. “I think I’m taking the day off.”
Then, “Come inside, if you want to.”
He doesn’t see it directly, but he would swear that Dice had grinned in response as he ignores the door and hoists himself up over the window. The brightness in Gentaro’s peripheral couldn’t have been anything but.
He looks just in time to see Dice stumbling inside though, and that gets him laughing, with happiness and relief both.
Outside, he can see that the lantern has recharged.
He thinks, maybe I should get a sign.
One of those that says, Sorry we’re CLOSED.
That’d be a good start.
Gentaro is used to to crowds.
He had tended to them so often and for so long that it’s almost second nature to move with them, or to maneuver through them, whichever of the two the moment called for. Tonight, it’s both, with everyone in said crowd wanting a piece of his attention, of his time, of anything he could give: a soundbite or a photo, an autograph or a wave. Tonight, he indulges them—but only as much as he wants to.
When he’s had his fill, he withdraws from the flashing lights to retreat into a light of his own, no less blinding than the cameras that had been trained on them since they got here.
“What are we doing all the way here?” asks Dice, laughing and incredulous as Gentaro pulls him into a corner away from the revelries. “Shouldn’t you be out there, raking in all the glory?
“Do I seem the type to enjoy that?”
“You tell me, Yumeno-sensei.”
The honorific has Gentaro blooming pink in the wake of its new meaning, but he doesn’t shy away from the feeling. Doing so would be a disservice to what had gotten him this far.
Back home, his small house is filled with twice the ink and paper, his shop window perpetually shut unless it’s to let in a patch of sun for Dice to sleep in. And when the sun reclines behind the horizon and lets darkness take its place, there is no lantern hung up to gauge his magic, no patrons lined up to ask for his blessing. There’s only Dice, always sitting close by in touching reach, were Gentaro to need a little reassurance to guide him out of a writer’s block.
There’s only the promise that never would he live for other people again.
“Well, I don’t,” he tells Dice as they hide from the press or blend in as needed, forgoing the ribbon-cutting to go on and find their seats inside. “There’s a reason I hide behind the page.”
“That’s too bad,” says Dice, with a squeeze of their clasped hands and a smirk dancing upon his mouth. “I think you have it in you.”
“Again with the flattery? Must you inflate my head until it fills this theatre?”
“Think that’s in my job description.”
“And that job would be—?”
“Professional sweet-talker.”
It’s Gentaro who’s laughing, this time, always laughing nowadays in the right company. It would be inaccurate to say that he’s always happy—that there were no hard times as he wrestled with the right words, that he didn’t miss the simplicity of his former calling—but he’s happy when it matters.
That ought to count for something.
“Hush, now,” he says, when the room goes dark and the curtain is drawn back. “It’s starting.”
He expects music, the narrator’s opening lines; not the kiss he’s pulled into, unseen to everyone else in seats near the exit, in the nonexistent lights.
“What was that for?”
“Good luck charm.”
“I’m hardly the one who needs it tonight. My work is done.”
“So what?” He hears the smile in Dice’s voice, tastes it in another kiss. “It’s your story playing out on that stage tonight. Close enough.”
It’s inappropriate to laugh, so Gentaro restrains himself, holding onto the warmth in his chest and the sound bursting from it for later, when the show’s over and done with.
“My poor actors, given so little credit.”
“They can deal.”
And really, he’s right.
Whatever Gentaro chooses from here on, everyone else can deal.