These words, I never thought I’d hear -

Isamu

Silence is like water, it takes time for the ripples to reach you.

Isamu, I

My hands are dirty with earth still, when I turn to see him. My garden is all I have left. I often succeed in believing it is enough.

Isamu, I was wrong.

“Wrong?”

Toichi’s head is bowed and greyed now. When we were young it shone like brass. His face turns up from looking at the trellises of pea blossoms, looks to me and in spite of myself I smile.

“Wrong about what?”
“Wrong about everything,” Toichi admits.
His eyes turn down briefly then back to me.
“Can we go inside? I’m cold.”

I serve him tea, nostalgia makes me use the same pot we had when we lived together. They’ve called me a recluse since the death of my wife, but I still keep my things nice, and Toichi can’t complain, not with pillows this comfortable, not with sencha this sharp and fragrant. I watch him close his eyes as he drinks and I feel the same I’ve felt for forty years.

Again, I am smiling in spite of myself.

I remember his words.

Isamu, I was wrong. Wrong about everything.

The aroma of the tea fills the small room.

“Keita left,” he says. “He won’t be coming back this time. He’s getting married. To some woman. I don’t know her.”

I hold my tongue. I burn it with tea to keep it quiet.

“I’ve never been happy,” Toichi says, setting down the teacup. His eyes assault me with their clearness. “Not with any of them.”
I would not always have been able to meet his gaze. But I have walked on the shore of life as long as he, and the boy I was is far distant now.

“What are you saying, Toichi.”

Eyes, unsettled perhaps by my unperturbedness, clip back down to the teacup.

I refill it.

Then mine.

“I think you were right, Isamu.”
“Well it’s too late now,” I say, catching the end of his sentence with mine. The piercing eyes return to my face and I do not flinch.

A lifetime passes as he seeks my features for some sign.

Then, he nods, and looks down again, fingers warming absent-mindedly on the teacup.

I watch them. They are still long and fine, his skin still fair.

He is still the most beautiful thing I’ve ever met.

I pick up my tea. It is golden and glows like a cat’s eye, and its fragrance fills my life and blots out the tears.

In the silence, ripples.

I guess

My eyes are closed to him, breathing in the warm breath of the tea. I remember crushing leaves with my fingers, fresh leaves, as a child.

I’ll

I open my eyes.

I guess I’ll be going, then.

The teacup makes a hollow sound as he places it on the old wooden table.

I don’t offer to drive him to the station. I’m not that strong.

I cut myself clipping a faded stem and the blood wells up. The gash is triangular and pooling blood drips onto the earth I kneel on, drips like the tears I wouldn’t allow myself. My blood cries after Toichi’s departure -

my heart pumps tears,

my heart pumps tears onto the ground.

I do not take the time to bandage it. I take the car -

I think to myself, I almost did it. 
Almost let him go. 
Almost…

But I’m a liar to pretend that even sixty years on he’s anything but my only desire. Blood drips down the steering wheel, the tears of my body.I step onto the empty platform just as the train pulls in. Empty. I get back in the car clutching my hand.

He never bought a ticket. One-way…

I drive recklessly, my heart getting loud in my ears. It is some minutes before I realize where I’m going.The river gets wild with the spring melt. The road takes me along its white-churned course, thick and crushing, louder than my heart.

I can see nothing in the waves.
Up ahead there is a footbridge -

As I am running, the blood drips from my finger and drops form at the corners of my eyes, tracing salty paths across my cheeks. 
My bloody hand touches him first - 

I pull him into my arms, out of breath, aching.

I’ve never held anything so tightly.

His arms slide around my waist and his face into my shoulder.

When I whisper, even over the rushing of the spray it is audible. My lips brush his ear.

“I didn’t believe you…”

He breathes against me, chest heaving, body warm.

This is a one-way ticket, sir

I breathe in the scent of Toichi’s hair.
My blood ruins his jacket.

The ticket handler recites his words to me:

No, that’s right. One way or another, I won’t be going back.

Memories, each like a drop of water, fall and shimmer and collide, until our reminiscence is like the surface of a lake in a storm. He takes my hands and crushes them in his, shivering, clear eyes searching my face, and for the first time in our lives, we kiss.

Isamu I was wrong

He rubs the tears from my face.

I kiss him again. I kiss him. I’ll never stop.

He rubs the blood off my hand, looking at my cut with concern.

“This will need stitches.”

I kiss him again.