Two halves make one whole fic - 1b
Kondou paused outside the door. Sougo had reported directly to him again today. This alone told him how overworked Hijikata must be. He hadn’t even needed to hear the whispered murmurs going on around the barracks. He should have suspected it. After all, Toshi had always been the type to shoulder everything on his own.
“Kondou-san,” he had said, a long, long time ago, “you just do what you want to do, leave everything else to me.”
Time and time again, he’d interfered whenever Toshi got too carried away with work, but like all the other times, he just couldn’t understand why the other man wouldn’t share the load.
“Kondou-san,” Toshi had told him, “you’re no good with these things. Leave it to me.”
And that’s where the problem was. Hijikata was too dependable, too reliable. He was getting spoiled, what with the way Hijikata always covered his back. Kondou wasn’t stupid - he realised a long time ago that as the Commander of the Shinsengumi, he really should be getting a lot more work than he was getting. But Hijikata always had things under control. It left him with almost nothing to do.
He tapped on the door. “Toshi?” he ventured.
A rustle of maybe papers, the sound of floorboards creaking and the door slid open to reveal his friend.
“Toshi!” he cried aghast, “You look terrible!”
“Doesn’t he, Kondou-san,” Sougo’s voice from behind him startled him, but Hijikata didn’t even blink.
“Have you been getting enough sleep?” Kondou forced his way into the room, Okita trailing easily behind him.
“He hasn’t been sleeping at all,” Okita answered, making himself comfortable where Hijikata had been previously sitting.
“That’s terrible! Toshi, you should take better care of yourself!”
“I keep telling him that, but he won’t listen to my advice.”
Hijikata’s left eye twitched.
“That’s no good, Toshi! You should listen to others, especially when they’re concerned about you!”
“That’s right, Hijikata-san. It makes me feel upset that you don’t listen to my advice.”
Hijikata snapped. “Shut up, both of you! Get out right now, I’ve got work to do, so get out!” He yanked Okita by the collar and threw him out. Kondou wisely followed his lead.
“Toshi,” he said, just before Hijikata slammed the door closed, “don’t push yourself.”
-
Inside, Hijikata simmered. How the hell can I not push myself! You’re all so carefree, someone at least needs to make sure things get done!
-
Okita was out patrolling a shoddy part of town. Normally he wouldn’t really bother because Hijikata would have had the place under close supervision already, but their vice commander was so bogged down with work lately that he’d forgotten to relay the orders, and the Shinsengumi, being a rag-tag bunch of misfits to begin with, took the chance to slack off. It couldn’t be helped.
He almost didn’t see the other man.
“Oi, Okita-kun!” Gintoki called lazily, half hidden in the shadows, “Aren’t you supposed to be working?”
He headed towards the older man. “Danna,” he greeted, “should you be in this part of town?”
“Eh,” Gin scratched his head, “I’m here on a job.”
“Oh?” Okita regarded him with some interest, “What are you supposed to be today?”
“A ninja.”
“A ninja?” he echoed.
Gin nodded. “You see, they sold out all the copies at the usual shops, so I had to come here specifically to get it.”
“Get what?”
“The latest issue of JUMP of course.”
“Is that really a job, or a personal mission, danna?”
“Heh,” Gin flicked something he managed to dig out from his ear.
They lapsed into a peaceful silence.
“So,” surprisingly, Gin was the one to break it, “how’s Oogushi-kun doing? Not that I care or anything,” he added, “but last time I saw him, he didn’t look too good.”
Okita was quiet for so long that he thought the other hadn’t heard, and he was about to repeat himself when he finally responded.
“Hijikata-san has always been that way. So I’m not really worried.”
Gin raised an eyebrow as he regarded the young officer. “Do you really believe that?” he asked.
Okita raised his head to meet his gaze head on. “Yes,” he answered confidently, “that man won’t be beaten by something like this.”
He huffed, “Well, it’s good that you have such confidence in Oogushi-kun, but no matter who it is, these things can really get to you.” He watched as Okita looked away briefly. “Well, you know him better than I do, so you don’t really have to listen to me.”
“I just think,” Okita began, before halting suddenly.
“…?”
“Sometimes I wish Hijikata-san would put a little more faith in the rest of us. He doesn’t have to do everything.”
“Well, that’s just how he is, isn’t it? That Oogushi-kun.”
Okita nodded distractedly, “Thanks danna.”
“Well,” Gin clapped him lightly on the back, “do your best to help him, Okita-kun.” He surveyed the area, “You can skip this neighbourhood, nothing’s going on here.”
“I was just taking a stroll, danna.”
“Sure, sure. You might want to check out the other side though.” He waved, “I’m going home.”
Okita watched him as he walked away, “Good night danna.”
Gin waved over his shoulder without looking back.
-
Finally, after more than two weeks of working non-stop and running on less than an hour’s sleep every night, finally, after all that, he was done.
It had been a while since he’d been out. Now was a good time as any.
“Hijikata-san!” the officers saluted as he walked past them.
He nodded in acknowledgement.
“Hijikata-san, are you going out?” Yamazaki asked excitedly, “Can I come?”
“No.” Honestly, he wasn’t sure he wanted company right then. He didn’t think he’d be able to manage a proper conversation. He was too tired to think properly, and while he wanted sleep and rest really badly, he wanted ramen even more.
Yamazaki’s face fell but he ignored it in favour of leaving.
“Don’t be out too late, Hijikata-san!” Yamazaki called after him.
“Yeah, yeah,” he replied, “you’re not the mother of me.”
He left to Yamazaki’s delighted laughter.
-
It was a peaceful night. There was a calming breeze, and the crickets were chirping away happily. There were even a couple of stars in the sky. It was calming.
That was, until he just had to run into that bastard Gintoki.
“Yo, Oogushi-kun!” the man greeted, his hand rising to his head in mock salute.
Hijikata resisted a groan. Maybe he should’ve slept instead. Then he wouldn’t have to deal with this.
“Oi, oi,” Gin reprimanded as he closed the distance between them, “what’s with that expression on your face? I don’t like it.”
“Oh?” he blew out smoke into the other’s face, “I think I’ll keep it then.”
Gin coughed and swatted the air in front of him desperately, “Are you trying to kill me?!”
“Hnn,” Hijikata stared indifferently at the coughing samurai, “my first break in days and I just have to see you. What bad luck.”
“Hey! I should be the one saying that!”
“Forget it, I’m not in the mood to deal with you,” he turned to walk away, really not up to arguing.
“Are you running away, Oogushi-kun?” Gin taunted.
Don’t rise to the bait, don’t rise to the bait… he told himself. “Of course not,” he snorted derisively, “I just think that I’d rather get some ramen than waste my time with you.”
An eye twitched. “Oh, really?” his voice had turned smooth, silky. A sign that he was getting angry.
“Yes, now if you would excuse me.” Hijikata made to step past, but an arm shot out to grab his wrist. “What the hell?!”
“You’re not going anywhere.”
Hijikata snarled angrily at the man, “Let me go you bastard!”
Gintoki ignored him and continued ranting, “And here I was being considerate. This is how I’m getting repaid?”
“What in the world are you talking about?” he demanded, trying to wrestle his wrist free from the vice grip.
A yell, and a crash. Hijikata tensed.
“Go get them Sadaharu!”
Hijikata stared.
“Not my head!” Shinpachi shrieked, “Them! Them! Katsura! Get him off my head!”
“They’re getting away! Gin-chan!”
Gin tightened his grip on Hijikata’s wrist. “Sorry Mr Policeman, but you’re going to stay here with me and watch.”
“What the hell is going on?!”
His question was answered when Sadaharu appeared, Shinpachi in his mouth, Kagura on his back.
“Gin-chan!” Kagura waved enthusiastically, “We caught the bad guys!”
“MMMPFF!!” Shinpachi’s legs kicked uselessly in the air, “HMMMPFFF!”
“What did Shinpachi say, Sadaharu?” the China girl asked.
Sadaharu spat Shinpachi out to the ground. The boy glared angrily as he wiped at his glasses furiously.
“Oh, good job you two,” Gin dragged Hijikata along, “you should thank us, Oogushi-kun.”
Not quite understanding what was going on, Hijikata allowed himself to be dragged.
“So, where are they?” Gin asked.
Kagura pointed. “I think they fainted.”
“They did not faint!” Shinpachi yelled, “Sadaharu chased them into a wall!”
“And then they fainted,” Kagura said agreeably.
Gin glanced at Hijikata, who was uncharacteristically silent. “Hijikata?”
“Eh?”
He loosened his hold on his hand, but Hijikata didn’t snatch his hand away. “You okay?”
Seeing Gin’s face so close spurred him to action. “Get away from me you bastard!” He shoved hard.
“You’re so not cute, Oogushi-kun,” Gin muttered, “anyway, you can go get your ramen now. Kagura, take Sadaharu and bring the men to the barracks.”
“Okay! Let’s go, Sadaharu!”
“Shinpachi, you can go home and get changed. You smell disgusting.”
“It’s not my fault!” the boy yelled, before stomping off.
“Oogushi-kun, let’s go.”
-
It was only when he was nearly done with his meal that he realised something.
“Oi, yorozuya,” he turned to glare at the other, “why did you come with me?”
Gin took a while to swallow before replying, “Because I want to eat too?”
Hijikata’s eyes narrowed.
“What is it?” he raised his hand and ordered another bowl, “You don’t like my company?”
“I don’t like you in general,” he growled.
Gin froze for a second before recovering. “You need to learn to be a little more grateful, Oogushi-kun. If not for us, you would’ve been done for.”
“That’s not true, this area has been under surveillance since the trouble started.”
“I hate to break the news to you but,” Gin gratefully accepted the new serving, “I haven’t seen your men around here lately. Just Okita-kun.”
Hijikata felt a vein about to pop. “What?”
Gin nodded at him, “You’ve been so busy you haven’t given them orders. So they’re off playing somewhere else.”
He didn’t know how to reply to that. So he kept quiet and stared at his half-eaten meal.
“Its okay, Oogushi-kun,” Gin reached out to pat his back comfortingly, “even someone like you can slip up. It’s not a crime.” When Hijikata didn’t respond, he leant closer, “Hey, don’t get too upset. It’s no big deal.”
Hijikata barely heard the words. He was too focused on what Gintoki had said earlier. Had he really failed to give his men orders?
“Anyway, it doesn’t matter,” Gin continued, “we all make mistakes. You don’t need to beat yourself up over it. Plus Gin-san was nice enough to cover for you.”
“Did Kondou-san ask you to?” he asked suddenly, that feeling of dread creeping up on him and clenching at his heart. If Kondou-san had to ask the yorozuya to help because he’d been too sloppy…
“Nah,” Gin answered easily, “nobody asked me anything.”
“Then how did you know?” the feeling was making him feel nauseous, so he pushed his bowl away.
“I met Okita-kun a few times. He seemed worried about you.”
That Sougo!
“So Gin-san decided he should be nice and help out Oogushi-kun in his time of need.”
Hijikata’s glare was potent enough to kill but Gin wasn’t deterred. In fact, he actually grinned.
“It’s okay to accept help from others. You didn’t ask for it, but it was offered. So just accept it, won’t you?”
“I-” Gin cut him off when he whispered in his ear.
“Listen, Hijikata. I know it’s your way of taking responsibility, but you should learn to relax a little. You work too hard.”
“Get away,” he pushed the other away, “you don’t work enough. I won’t be lectured by someone like you.”
Annoyed, Gin glared back. “I’m saying this out of concern, believe it or not. No one expects you to be perfect, Hijikata. Its all right to let someone else do your job sometimes.”
“It’s none of your business!” he hissed.
“But it is,” Gin set his chopsticks down to regard the other seriously, “it is, because I feel it’s my responsibility to make sure you don’t overwork yourself. Nobody really understands why you’re doing it, but I think I do, so I’ve got the burden of stopping you from killing yourself.”
It took a moment for the words to sink in, and when it did, Hijikata had never felt more insulted in his life.
“The hell you’re saying-” he aimed a punch at the face staring seriously back at him, but Gin caught it. “Let go!” he tried to yank his hand back.
Fingers curled around his fist. “I know you think that no one else can do it, so you have to do it, but if you keep going like that, not even you can keep up.”
“What do you know, you curly-haired bastard?! And let me go!”
“I know,” Gin got to his feet, threw some change on the table and led Hijikata out the shop.
“Where are we going?! Let go of my hand!”
Gin ignored his protests and dragged him into a dark alley. He slammed the other man into the wall.
Hijikata gasped, startled by the sudden aggression. He refused however, to back down when Gin cornered him, his back to the wall, his eyes staring defiantly back.
Gin finally sighed and released his hold. He stepped back.
“I know because there are things only I can do, even if I don’t want to do them.”
Hijikata stared at him in surprise. The way those shoulders slumped, the way his head hung… Gin looked, for all the world, weary.
“It’s all right to work hard, but you have to take care of yourself also.” He raised a hand and brushed his fingers gently against Hijikata’s cheek. “Look at you, you look like crap.”
Hijikata swatted the hand away but didn’t do anything else.
“And it’s not nice to make everyone worry like that. You have to realise that what you do will affect everyone else. I’ve never seen Okita-kun so depressed.”
“Sougo?” he asked, curious.
Gin smiled, and stepped closer. “Yeah, he was really worried about you. Can’t blame him, I’d be really worried too if I saw you killing yourself everyday.”
“He’s out to get me,” Hijikata stated matter-of-factly, “he’s always wanted me dead.”
“Heh.” They were so close now, and the closeness was making Hijikata uncomfortable.
“Don’t come so close,” he tried to push the other man away.
“I’m just collecting my payment.”
“I thought you said nobody asked you to do this?!”
“Nobody did,” Gin leaned close, “it was something I wanted to do, and this is for self-satisfaction.” He pressed his lips to Hijikata’s.
Hijikata’s eyes widened. His body had frozen in shock. He’d expected Gintoki to try and steal his wallet from him, not this. When a tongue probed at his lips however, he reacted instinctively and socked the man a hard one.
“OWWWW!” Gin sat on the floor rubbing his jaw.
“Idiot! Don’t get carried away!” He flushed angrily, wiping viciously at his lips, “I won’t forget this!” He stomped away.
Gin stared after him. A smile tugged at his lips. “Neither will I…”
-
Shit, Hijikata cursed, I shouldn’t have responded like that! I’m sure he’ll see it as encouragement!
That night, Hijikata fell asleep dreaming of sneaky white-haired samurais.
-
“Kondou-san,” he had said, a long, long time ago, “you just do what you want to do, leave everything else to me.”
Time and time again, he’d interfered whenever Toshi got too carried away with work, but like all the other times, he just couldn’t understand why the other man wouldn’t share the load.
“Kondou-san,” Toshi had told him, “you’re no good with these things. Leave it to me.”
And that’s where the problem was. Hijikata was too dependable, too reliable. He was getting spoiled, what with the way Hijikata always covered his back. Kondou wasn’t stupid - he realised a long time ago that as the Commander of the Shinsengumi, he really should be getting a lot more work than he was getting. But Hijikata always had things under control. It left him with almost nothing to do.
He tapped on the door. “Toshi?” he ventured.
A rustle of maybe papers, the sound of floorboards creaking and the door slid open to reveal his friend.
“Toshi!” he cried aghast, “You look terrible!”
“Doesn’t he, Kondou-san,” Sougo’s voice from behind him startled him, but Hijikata didn’t even blink.
“Have you been getting enough sleep?” Kondou forced his way into the room, Okita trailing easily behind him.
“He hasn’t been sleeping at all,” Okita answered, making himself comfortable where Hijikata had been previously sitting.
“That’s terrible! Toshi, you should take better care of yourself!”
“I keep telling him that, but he won’t listen to my advice.”
Hijikata’s left eye twitched.
“That’s no good, Toshi! You should listen to others, especially when they’re concerned about you!”
“That’s right, Hijikata-san. It makes me feel upset that you don’t listen to my advice.”
Hijikata snapped. “Shut up, both of you! Get out right now, I’ve got work to do, so get out!” He yanked Okita by the collar and threw him out. Kondou wisely followed his lead.
“Toshi,” he said, just before Hijikata slammed the door closed, “don’t push yourself.”
-
Inside, Hijikata simmered. How the hell can I not push myself! You’re all so carefree, someone at least needs to make sure things get done!
-
Okita was out patrolling a shoddy part of town. Normally he wouldn’t really bother because Hijikata would have had the place under close supervision already, but their vice commander was so bogged down with work lately that he’d forgotten to relay the orders, and the Shinsengumi, being a rag-tag bunch of misfits to begin with, took the chance to slack off. It couldn’t be helped.
He almost didn’t see the other man.
“Oi, Okita-kun!” Gintoki called lazily, half hidden in the shadows, “Aren’t you supposed to be working?”
He headed towards the older man. “Danna,” he greeted, “should you be in this part of town?”
“Eh,” Gin scratched his head, “I’m here on a job.”
“Oh?” Okita regarded him with some interest, “What are you supposed to be today?”
“A ninja.”
“A ninja?” he echoed.
Gin nodded. “You see, they sold out all the copies at the usual shops, so I had to come here specifically to get it.”
“Get what?”
“The latest issue of JUMP of course.”
“Is that really a job, or a personal mission, danna?”
“Heh,” Gin flicked something he managed to dig out from his ear.
They lapsed into a peaceful silence.
“So,” surprisingly, Gin was the one to break it, “how’s Oogushi-kun doing? Not that I care or anything,” he added, “but last time I saw him, he didn’t look too good.”
Okita was quiet for so long that he thought the other hadn’t heard, and he was about to repeat himself when he finally responded.
“Hijikata-san has always been that way. So I’m not really worried.”
Gin raised an eyebrow as he regarded the young officer. “Do you really believe that?” he asked.
Okita raised his head to meet his gaze head on. “Yes,” he answered confidently, “that man won’t be beaten by something like this.”
He huffed, “Well, it’s good that you have such confidence in Oogushi-kun, but no matter who it is, these things can really get to you.” He watched as Okita looked away briefly. “Well, you know him better than I do, so you don’t really have to listen to me.”
“I just think,” Okita began, before halting suddenly.
“…?”
“Sometimes I wish Hijikata-san would put a little more faith in the rest of us. He doesn’t have to do everything.”
“Well, that’s just how he is, isn’t it? That Oogushi-kun.”
Okita nodded distractedly, “Thanks danna.”
“Well,” Gin clapped him lightly on the back, “do your best to help him, Okita-kun.” He surveyed the area, “You can skip this neighbourhood, nothing’s going on here.”
“I was just taking a stroll, danna.”
“Sure, sure. You might want to check out the other side though.” He waved, “I’m going home.”
Okita watched him as he walked away, “Good night danna.”
Gin waved over his shoulder without looking back.
-
Finally, after more than two weeks of working non-stop and running on less than an hour’s sleep every night, finally, after all that, he was done.
It had been a while since he’d been out. Now was a good time as any.
“Hijikata-san!” the officers saluted as he walked past them.
He nodded in acknowledgement.
“Hijikata-san, are you going out?” Yamazaki asked excitedly, “Can I come?”
“No.” Honestly, he wasn’t sure he wanted company right then. He didn’t think he’d be able to manage a proper conversation. He was too tired to think properly, and while he wanted sleep and rest really badly, he wanted ramen even more.
Yamazaki’s face fell but he ignored it in favour of leaving.
“Don’t be out too late, Hijikata-san!” Yamazaki called after him.
“Yeah, yeah,” he replied, “you’re not the mother of me.”
He left to Yamazaki’s delighted laughter.
-
It was a peaceful night. There was a calming breeze, and the crickets were chirping away happily. There were even a couple of stars in the sky. It was calming.
That was, until he just had to run into that bastard Gintoki.
“Yo, Oogushi-kun!” the man greeted, his hand rising to his head in mock salute.
Hijikata resisted a groan. Maybe he should’ve slept instead. Then he wouldn’t have to deal with this.
“Oi, oi,” Gin reprimanded as he closed the distance between them, “what’s with that expression on your face? I don’t like it.”
“Oh?” he blew out smoke into the other’s face, “I think I’ll keep it then.”
Gin coughed and swatted the air in front of him desperately, “Are you trying to kill me?!”
“Hnn,” Hijikata stared indifferently at the coughing samurai, “my first break in days and I just have to see you. What bad luck.”
“Hey! I should be the one saying that!”
“Forget it, I’m not in the mood to deal with you,” he turned to walk away, really not up to arguing.
“Are you running away, Oogushi-kun?” Gin taunted.
Don’t rise to the bait, don’t rise to the bait… he told himself. “Of course not,” he snorted derisively, “I just think that I’d rather get some ramen than waste my time with you.”
An eye twitched. “Oh, really?” his voice had turned smooth, silky. A sign that he was getting angry.
“Yes, now if you would excuse me.” Hijikata made to step past, but an arm shot out to grab his wrist. “What the hell?!”
“You’re not going anywhere.”
Hijikata snarled angrily at the man, “Let me go you bastard!”
Gintoki ignored him and continued ranting, “And here I was being considerate. This is how I’m getting repaid?”
“What in the world are you talking about?” he demanded, trying to wrestle his wrist free from the vice grip.
A yell, and a crash. Hijikata tensed.
“Go get them Sadaharu!”
Hijikata stared.
“Not my head!” Shinpachi shrieked, “Them! Them! Katsura! Get him off my head!”
“They’re getting away! Gin-chan!”
Gin tightened his grip on Hijikata’s wrist. “Sorry Mr Policeman, but you’re going to stay here with me and watch.”
“What the hell is going on?!”
His question was answered when Sadaharu appeared, Shinpachi in his mouth, Kagura on his back.
“Gin-chan!” Kagura waved enthusiastically, “We caught the bad guys!”
“MMMPFF!!” Shinpachi’s legs kicked uselessly in the air, “HMMMPFFF!”
“What did Shinpachi say, Sadaharu?” the China girl asked.
Sadaharu spat Shinpachi out to the ground. The boy glared angrily as he wiped at his glasses furiously.
“Oh, good job you two,” Gin dragged Hijikata along, “you should thank us, Oogushi-kun.”
Not quite understanding what was going on, Hijikata allowed himself to be dragged.
“So, where are they?” Gin asked.
Kagura pointed. “I think they fainted.”
“They did not faint!” Shinpachi yelled, “Sadaharu chased them into a wall!”
“And then they fainted,” Kagura said agreeably.
Gin glanced at Hijikata, who was uncharacteristically silent. “Hijikata?”
“Eh?”
He loosened his hold on his hand, but Hijikata didn’t snatch his hand away. “You okay?”
Seeing Gin’s face so close spurred him to action. “Get away from me you bastard!” He shoved hard.
“You’re so not cute, Oogushi-kun,” Gin muttered, “anyway, you can go get your ramen now. Kagura, take Sadaharu and bring the men to the barracks.”
“Okay! Let’s go, Sadaharu!”
“Shinpachi, you can go home and get changed. You smell disgusting.”
“It’s not my fault!” the boy yelled, before stomping off.
“Oogushi-kun, let’s go.”
-
It was only when he was nearly done with his meal that he realised something.
“Oi, yorozuya,” he turned to glare at the other, “why did you come with me?”
Gin took a while to swallow before replying, “Because I want to eat too?”
Hijikata’s eyes narrowed.
“What is it?” he raised his hand and ordered another bowl, “You don’t like my company?”
“I don’t like you in general,” he growled.
Gin froze for a second before recovering. “You need to learn to be a little more grateful, Oogushi-kun. If not for us, you would’ve been done for.”
“That’s not true, this area has been under surveillance since the trouble started.”
“I hate to break the news to you but,” Gin gratefully accepted the new serving, “I haven’t seen your men around here lately. Just Okita-kun.”
Hijikata felt a vein about to pop. “What?”
Gin nodded at him, “You’ve been so busy you haven’t given them orders. So they’re off playing somewhere else.”
He didn’t know how to reply to that. So he kept quiet and stared at his half-eaten meal.
“Its okay, Oogushi-kun,” Gin reached out to pat his back comfortingly, “even someone like you can slip up. It’s not a crime.” When Hijikata didn’t respond, he leant closer, “Hey, don’t get too upset. It’s no big deal.”
Hijikata barely heard the words. He was too focused on what Gintoki had said earlier. Had he really failed to give his men orders?
“Anyway, it doesn’t matter,” Gin continued, “we all make mistakes. You don’t need to beat yourself up over it. Plus Gin-san was nice enough to cover for you.”
“Did Kondou-san ask you to?” he asked suddenly, that feeling of dread creeping up on him and clenching at his heart. If Kondou-san had to ask the yorozuya to help because he’d been too sloppy…
“Nah,” Gin answered easily, “nobody asked me anything.”
“Then how did you know?” the feeling was making him feel nauseous, so he pushed his bowl away.
“I met Okita-kun a few times. He seemed worried about you.”
That Sougo!
“So Gin-san decided he should be nice and help out Oogushi-kun in his time of need.”
Hijikata’s glare was potent enough to kill but Gin wasn’t deterred. In fact, he actually grinned.
“It’s okay to accept help from others. You didn’t ask for it, but it was offered. So just accept it, won’t you?”
“I-” Gin cut him off when he whispered in his ear.
“Listen, Hijikata. I know it’s your way of taking responsibility, but you should learn to relax a little. You work too hard.”
“Get away,” he pushed the other away, “you don’t work enough. I won’t be lectured by someone like you.”
Annoyed, Gin glared back. “I’m saying this out of concern, believe it or not. No one expects you to be perfect, Hijikata. Its all right to let someone else do your job sometimes.”
“It’s none of your business!” he hissed.
“But it is,” Gin set his chopsticks down to regard the other seriously, “it is, because I feel it’s my responsibility to make sure you don’t overwork yourself. Nobody really understands why you’re doing it, but I think I do, so I’ve got the burden of stopping you from killing yourself.”
It took a moment for the words to sink in, and when it did, Hijikata had never felt more insulted in his life.
“The hell you’re saying-” he aimed a punch at the face staring seriously back at him, but Gin caught it. “Let go!” he tried to yank his hand back.
Fingers curled around his fist. “I know you think that no one else can do it, so you have to do it, but if you keep going like that, not even you can keep up.”
“What do you know, you curly-haired bastard?! And let me go!”
“I know,” Gin got to his feet, threw some change on the table and led Hijikata out the shop.
“Where are we going?! Let go of my hand!”
Gin ignored his protests and dragged him into a dark alley. He slammed the other man into the wall.
Hijikata gasped, startled by the sudden aggression. He refused however, to back down when Gin cornered him, his back to the wall, his eyes staring defiantly back.
Gin finally sighed and released his hold. He stepped back.
“I know because there are things only I can do, even if I don’t want to do them.”
Hijikata stared at him in surprise. The way those shoulders slumped, the way his head hung… Gin looked, for all the world, weary.
“It’s all right to work hard, but you have to take care of yourself also.” He raised a hand and brushed his fingers gently against Hijikata’s cheek. “Look at you, you look like crap.”
Hijikata swatted the hand away but didn’t do anything else.
“And it’s not nice to make everyone worry like that. You have to realise that what you do will affect everyone else. I’ve never seen Okita-kun so depressed.”
“Sougo?” he asked, curious.
Gin smiled, and stepped closer. “Yeah, he was really worried about you. Can’t blame him, I’d be really worried too if I saw you killing yourself everyday.”
“He’s out to get me,” Hijikata stated matter-of-factly, “he’s always wanted me dead.”
“Heh.” They were so close now, and the closeness was making Hijikata uncomfortable.
“Don’t come so close,” he tried to push the other man away.
“I’m just collecting my payment.”
“I thought you said nobody asked you to do this?!”
“Nobody did,” Gin leaned close, “it was something I wanted to do, and this is for self-satisfaction.” He pressed his lips to Hijikata’s.
Hijikata’s eyes widened. His body had frozen in shock. He’d expected Gintoki to try and steal his wallet from him, not this. When a tongue probed at his lips however, he reacted instinctively and socked the man a hard one.
“OWWWW!” Gin sat on the floor rubbing his jaw.
“Idiot! Don’t get carried away!” He flushed angrily, wiping viciously at his lips, “I won’t forget this!” He stomped away.
Gin stared after him. A smile tugged at his lips. “Neither will I…”
-
Shit, Hijikata cursed, I shouldn’t have responded like that! I’m sure he’ll see it as encouragement!
That night, Hijikata fell asleep dreaming of sneaky white-haired samurais.
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