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…ah, he’s the same, Denji thought as a fist collided with his jaw. Yet another shitty person in this shitty world that he had to put up with. He had expected a beating when the older devil hunter had led him into an empty, seedy alleyway, but to have his guess confirmed was another thing. Denji had hoped—
Hoped what?
What had he been expecting?
Nothing good ever came free.
This jerk, Aki Hayakawa, was another catch, another snag, another crack in the seemingly picturesque offer Makima-san gave him.
***
When Denji was informed that he was living with the stuck-up jerk, the teenager’s dwindling mood completely plummeted.
He was going to have to cohabitate with some dude who was also a full-grown adult, a demographic his past experiences had doubtlessly and rigorously impressed upon him, again and again, to be fucking rotten, callous, and rapacious. Worse yet, the other made no secret that he detested Denji. The first excuse the other got, the teenager would be put down like a diseased dog. The knowledge had his body buzzing with uncomfortable energy.
Denji stared morosely after the man as the other led the way to his apartment.
Why couldn’t he have roomed in with Makima-san instead?
"We’re here," the jerk informed him, stopping before a door. He grabbed a key from his breast pocket, unlocked the doorknob and stepped in.
The teenager followed behind reluctantly.
The man did not walk far, halting again in the entryway. He indicated a door to the left. "That’s the room that you’ll be using. Feel free to store your clothes in the dresser. Make sure to clean up after yourself."
He paused, eyeing the teenager from head to toe, nose wrinkling slightly.
The other probably thought him filthy and disgusting, which, while not unreasonable, still had his hackles rising.
"Take a bath," the jerk ordered, "I’m not letting you roll around my apartment smelling like trash."
"You’re the one that kicked me into a garbage dump," Denji dully shot back as he fumed inside.
Usually, this sort of crap — being looked at like he was the dirt sullying someone’s shoe — hardly bothered him. Living in destitution meant that there was not a lot that he could do about personal hygiene, and he got used to being on the receiving end of revulsion. He’s built some impressively thick skin, but something about the man ticked him off.
The other returned his gaze, firm and unrepentant.
"Fine," Denji relented. He didn’t remember the last time he took a clean bath — or even a just bath, period. He was looking forward to the prospect, and that exceeded pride and annoyance alike. "Where?"
The other pointed to the first door to the right. "That’s the bathroom," and to the second door, "The toilet is in there. Makima-san said that you brought nothing when you came to Tōkyō?"
The dude was likely hoping that Denji would say the opposite. Too bad — he came empty-handed. The teenager nodded.
The jerk frowned, and after a second, he said, "I’ll let you borrow my stuff. We’ll go shopping for your own toiletries and whatnot tomorrow. I’ll leave a towel and change of clothing for you at the door."
With that dismissal, the man went.
Denji entered the bathroom. It was large, clean, and well-maintained, with a sizeable tub. Most of the space was empty, reserved for washing up. On the floor was a small plastic chair and a smattering of bottles.
It was not until Denji had stripped and doused himself with water that he realised he had no idea what the bottles were for.
"Hayakawa!" He called, throwing open the door. He sought out the man, moving further into the apartment. He found him in the kitchen, standing over the sink with a rice pot in his hand. "What the hell is up with all these goddamn bottles?!"
"You’re dripping all over the floor!" Fucking hell, the man was a nagger. "And don’t walk around naked! Cover your crotch, at least!" The jerk paused, expression flickering in puzzlement, "What do you mean by bottles?"
Sick by the lack of progress, the teen grabbed the man and dragged him to the bathroom. The other put up surprisingly little resistance.
At the bathroom, Denji gestured to the bottles, "I don’t know what any of them are for."
The man gave him an aggrieved look. "At least cover yourself," he said.
After the teen dutifully complied, the other moved inside. He crouched before the bottles and explained each carefully: "These two are for your hair. This one is the shampoo. Use it first. This one is the conditioner. Use this after. This one is for your body. Got that?"
The teenager inclined his head. "Yeah."
Unwillingness on his face, the man offered, "Do you want me to draw you up a bath?"
"Nah," Denji said, "You can go now," he added with a shooing motion. That got him an irritated glare and a quick retreat.
Alone, the teenager breathed a sigh, eyes landing on the spot where the jerk had knelt.
He had expected impatience, condescension, maybe even some disdain, in response to his ignorance, but the jerk had been… Not like that.
Somehow the kindness was even more off-putting. It had Denji feeling weird and wrong-footed.
Averting his gaze, the teen got on with his bath. He was good at that, ignoring what made him uneasy.
***
Denji left the bathroom, practically floating in blissful happiness. Freshening up had revitalised him with a vigour rarely felt, evidenced in the looseness in his body and the effortlessness of his smile.
He ambled down the corridor.
As the teen had thought, the jerk was still in the kitchen, a cutting board laid in front of him, slicing through an onion with fluid, practised ease. The other looked up when Denji appeared from behind the corner and gave the latter a scrutinising once-over.
The man clicked his tongue, face scrunching with irritation before he put the knife down and approached.
Denji held himself purposefully still, not wanting to physically lash out — at least that way, he could tell Makima-san that the man was the one who fought him first — except the jerk was yanking on the towel that hung off his shoulder and draping the cloth over his head.
"You’re worse than a dog," the other muttered, tone exasperated, but his hands were light, rubbing the towel gently over his hair. Denji could only blink dumbly, blindsided.
The man was griping in the background: "Dry your hair properly, or else you’ll catch a cold."
"It’s not like I’ll die," Denji managed through the haze over his mind.
The man froze and looked at him with stormy blue eyes. The teen watched as his jaw clenched before he pulled away, leaving the towel dangling over his head. As though nothing happened, the jerk resumed his cooking.
When the blonde stood there hovering awkwardly, the other instructed, "Go sit down at the table. There’s a TV in the living room if that’s your thing, and the remote is next to it. I’ll bring over dinner to you soon."
"You’re making me food?" Denji asked incredulously and with more awe in his voice than he liked.
"May as well," the jerk said, "I’m already cooking. Don’t expect anything for breakfast, though."
Sensing a close to the conversation, the teenager bounded into the living room.
The room was spacious, and aside from a small flowerpot, everything seemed to exist with a practical purpose. The centre was taken up by a low wooden table, and a mat sat, cushioning the floor underneath. Adjacent to the kitchen was a veranda with loose-hanging curtains. A wall was lined by three shelves, and, as the jerk had stated, a TV was propped up on the middle one with the remote in front.
Denji grabbed the remote and settled at the table across from the jerk. He fiddled aimlessly with the remote for a moment, never having touched one before, until he hit a red button which caused the TV to turn on, displaying a pretty woman talking about weather forecasts.
Denji watched, intrigued, but the novelty quickly fizzed out, and he grew bored even with the attractive presenter on the screen. The teenager ended up observing the jerk as he cooked instead.
Bizarrely enough, there was something interesting about how the man moved around the kitchen, sure and calm and with a single-minded focus. A sense of tranquillity existed around the scene, in the rhythmic chop-chop-chop of the knife, the low burbling of heating water, and the crackle of searing meat. The sereneness was infectious, bringing the blonde’s thoughts to a pleasant lull.
Soon the room was suffused with warmth and the heavenly aroma of spices. Denji may have drooled, but hey, who could blame him? He rubbed at his rumbling stomach, growing tentatively excited.
When the jerk started plating the food, he returned to watching the TV, not wanting to be caught and forced to explain himself.
"Here." A click on the table and a quiet scrape as a plate was pushed towards the teen. On top was a large heap of rice topped with curry. Each cut of vegetable and beef was generous.
It was the most food he ever had in one sitting.
"Wow," the Denji vocalised, breathless with anticipation. The blonde spooned a bite and moaned at the taste, "Hayakawa, you’re good!"
The man gave him no reply and sat down on the other side, busying himself with his own dinner.
Unperturbed, the teenager continued to dig into the curry with gusto, literally inhaling the food. Within no time, he was done, and he slammed his spoon down with a feelingly said, "Thank you."
His delight was short-lived, however, as his stomach churned painfully and sickeningly. Nausea was building, increasing rapidly to a dizzying crescendo, and the blonde barely made it to the toilet before he vomited up his dinner.
He noted footsteps, getting louder as someone came closer, but was too preoccupied with spewing his guts out to pay that any mind. When, mercifully, his stomach ceased its protesting, the teenager twisted around to see the jerk, a shirt over one arm and a glass of water in the other hand.
The man held out the glass, "Drink. Slowly."
Once Denji downed the entire glass and placed the cup on the floor, the jerk asked, "Was there something wrong with the food?" On the other’s face was the most neutral expression he had ever directed at the blonde, eyes clear of his usual hostility and measured as they observed him shrewdly.
"No clue," Denji answered carelessly. He turned away to give his regurgitated curry rice a mournful look, "Damn. What a waste of good food." He groaned, physically pained by the reminder, "Ugh, so much food, all of it — gone to waste."
Denji heard as the other shifted, picking up the glass and placing down the shirt. "I’m going to portion your food," the jerk said.
Denji whipped his head up. "What?" There was no way he could do that!
…right?
The man blinked. "I’m not going to starve you," he assured. "I’m guessing you’re not used to getting three proper meals within a day?"
Denji gave a begrudging nod.
"In that case, it’s likely that your body is incapable of processing the amount of food you ate and forced you to expel it. Start by eating less. Bit by bit, we’ll increase your intake as your stomach gets used to regularly receiving meals."
Denji scowled, chaffed by the idea of someone else limiting what he could consume.
"Look," the man said, looking drained and leaning back against the door frame, "I may think you’re dumb, obnoxious and disgusting, but as much as we both hate it, you were put in my care. I have a responsibility to you now that you have no choice but to work. And needlessly torturing you would be counterproductive. This is a temporary arrangement, and soon you’ll be free to pig out without worrying about sicking yourself to death," the other looked at him expectantly, "Good?"
"Fine," Denji acquiesced and, silently daring the other the refute, tacked on, "but I want to choose what we’re eating."
The jerk nodded his head immediately. "Alright," he said, pushing himself off the frame.
"Change," the man told him, looking pointedly in his general direction. The teenager followed the gaze to find his borrowed shirt was stained brown with curry sauce. "And flush the toilet before you leave," he reminded — the asshole like he wanted to stink up the apartment with the stench of vomit; he was living there too! — and stepped out, shutting the door behind him.
The teenager dropped his head on the toilet seat, taking a moment to breathe and gather his strength before he got up.
***
When Denji emerged from the toilet, the jerk vanished from the kitchen and living room. Everything on the table had been cleared, the dirtied dishes stacked up and left to soak in the sink. Circling back to the hallway, he noticed the bathroom light was on.
He’s bathing, the blonde deduced.
He went back to the TV, which was covering some victorious fight against a devil. He dithered between checking out his bedroom, not yet tired and guessing nothing noteworthy would probably be in there or suffering through more mind-numbing commentary.
He wound up on the veranda, taking in the cityscape at night in all its scintillating, colourful glory. It’s a view he was not privy to before, in the slums where everything was falling apart, squalid and soaked in misery. It was almost like standing in another universe.
He heard the faint click of a door closing, and the jerk was popping into view from the mouth of the hallway, dressed differently and with his dark hair down to frame his delicate face. The other did not notice him, going straight to the fridge and pulling something out, or that was how he seemed, until he turned around, immediately catching the blonde’s gaze, and gestured him to come inside with a finger.
"What?" Denji said, coming up behind the counter.
The jerk’s mouth thinned as he placed two items before him — an apple and a water bottle. "Try eating this," he said, finger tapping once on the former, and, with a warning in his tone, "Don’t stuff your face this time, and stop as soon as you get full."
Denji picked up the apple and held it up for inspection. The fruit was bright red and shiny in his hand — there was no sign of decay. He took a bite and hummed with pleasure, moreish tart sweetness coating his tongue.
The man watched him, appearing afraid that the teenager would bowl over with sickness and besmirch his apartment. Once his worry was assuaged, he rolled his sleeves up and tackled the dishes.
Denji moved over to the table, sitting where he sat before and munched steadily through his apple as he alternated between idly watching the man and the TV.
The other was done by the time he got halfway, and after drying off his hands with a towel, he regarded the blonde. "Don’t forget to turn off the TV before you sleep." He tilted his head to the shōji sliding door. "If you need me, my room is there."
He bade, "Goodnight," and walked off into his bedroom.
The blonde mindfully cracked open the water bottle and took a long gulp. Denji wanted to scream, demand the man for answers and maybe shake him for good measure but swallowed down the urge.
***
Denji woke up and stared with confusion at the white, intact ceiling before he remembered, in a great, disorienting rush, the events of his previous day. He sat up and scanned the room.
Nothing had changed from yesterday — all the room contained was the bed and a dresser, which had been empty when he checked.
Denji peeled off the blanket and stumbled onto his feet. He shuffled to the door, yawning widely.
Exiting, he was met with a nutty, earthy scent. When he passed by the kitchen, though, the jerk was not in there. On the drying rack sat a single cup and a bizarre glass jug with a neck that curved and fanned outward. He guessed that the man had made a type of beverage in lieu of breakfast and was not kidding when he said not to expect anything.
The sliding of a door caught his attention, turning his head in time to see the jerk coming in from the veranda, rumpled but bright-eyed, with an empty basket in hand. He peered behind the man to see clothes on a line, hung out to dry.
The other spotted the blonde quickly, face relaxed as he said, "There’s bread on the counter and jam in the cupboard next to the fridge. Help yourself, but don’t go overboard." He drifted past, heading inside the bathroom, leaving the teenager standing there, oddly shaken.
A terrible plan hatched in his mind.
***
It was almost a relief when the jerk pushed his head into the window — up until the man went off on some righteous spiel about not taking devil hunting seriously and sending Denji head-first into an existential dilemma that was.
For the sake of getting the jerk to act like a jerk, the blonde had taken the effort to be excessively unpleasant — from going too far with the toast and making a colossal mess that took forever to clean to taking his sweet time in the bath and falling asleep on the toilet.
The last one might not have been done deliberately — the yakuza were a nocturnal bunch of bastards, and the earliest he got called in was at noon, so waking up and getting up at eight was an adjustment — but the effect was the same: the jerk got aggravated.
His frustration never went anywhere, however. He bitched and moaned, sure, but there was not even a single physical reproach. Instead, the jerk got quieter, face dark but silently fuming, before mentioning that Makima-san was waiting and that being late on his first official day at work would be spitting in the face of her kindness.
That had gotten Denji to sober up and put his ploy on the back burner.
Today had turned out to be a lot like the previous in that the jerk had led Denji around as he went about his patrol. Though, this time, the fighting had been left to the blonde.
The shift had dragged on for the most part, with the teen having taken to riling up the older devil hunter, half in forward to his goal of getting the jerk to behave like one and partly to stave off the tedium.
Aside from that, absolutely nothing had happened until near the end with the bird-eating fiend at the house, and he was so weak that a single swish of his axe was enough to kill him. The jerk was decidedly unhappy about that and pushed his head into the window before going off on his holier-than-thou speech, which should have made him happy and vindicated, but just resulted in him knee-deep in a search for meaning.
With that lacklustre climax, Denji finished his first day as a Public Safety devil hunter.
Now Denji may be simplistic, but he was not stupid — he knew he had been a little shit to the jerk the entire day, so when the other showed him to the men’s locker room and shoved a set of casual clothes at him — muttering, "Don’t take too long. I want to finish shopping sometime today," — he was shocked.
He had expected the man to tell him to fuck off and resolve his I-have-nothing situation himself. Or, if the dude thought he was born yesterday and did not trust him to figure it out himself, foist him onto someone else to deal with the problem. No one could blame him, but the jerk was set on accompanying him. What the hell was up with that? Did he come off as that big of a flight risk, or was the jerk that much of a stickler to protocol?
Rather than dwell on the perplexing enigma that was Aki Hayakawa, Denji briskly changed. He was out in record time and got an approving nod from the older devil hunter, who had been waiting by the door.
The teen felt nothing whatsoever.
"We’ll head to the department store first and then the supermarket," the other told him, obliviously unaware and striding for an exit.
"I don’t have any money, you know," the teenager drawled, falling in step with the man.
"Public Safety is paying," the jerk said, "Buy whatever you want, but nothing too unreasonable or else they’ll call you in for an explanation. It’ll be a huge pain for Makima-san as well. She’s the one that set this up for you."
"Got it," Denji said, saluting.
***
The department store was ginormous, with shelves and racks that seemed to sprawl farther than the eye could see. Denji was impressed and utterly intrigued by the sheer magnitude and array of stuff put for sale, some of which he never even knew existed.
The jerk grabbed the blonde right before he darted into the store and dragged him like an errant child to a lowly walled-off section that contained rows and rows of large iron mesh baskets on wheels.
"These are trolleys," the jerk supplied without the teen having to ask, "Take one with you to hold everything you pick out. I’m going to wait for you over there," the jerk waved a hand at the cushioned bench propped against a square stone column. "Here’s a list of things you should buy at the minimum," he handed over a piece of paper, to which the blonde gawped because the list was long and contained words that he didn’t know how to read, "If you need help with anything or if you’re done, you know where to find me."
"You’re giving me free rein?" the teenager asked, surprised.
He thought the man was here as surveillance. To make sure that he did not run away or go berserk or something. Should he not stay close?
The man nodded, seeing no problem.
***
Thirty minutes later, the jerk looked from Denji to the empty trolly with great mystification.
When an explanation was not forthcoming, the other ventured, "What is the problem?"
Denji grimaced, loathing the fact that he had to admit, "I don’t know what to choose. There’s…" he dithered, fishing around his head for a word that encapsulated the mind-bogglingly vast expanse of choices there was, and the uncertainty that generated, "too much."
The jerk processed that information for a long beat before getting up. "I’m going to pick some things out. Just say so if there’s something you don’t want or if you do. Let’s start with clothes."
The jerk grabbed the trolley and proceeded to shop for his clothing in the most pragmatic way possible, which should not have surprised the teen so much, looking back at the man’s apartment. He kept to simple solid colours for the most part, selecting between articles by a criterion that eluded the blonde. When he tried on each piece in the changing room, Denji found they were comfortable and a little too big.
Denji said yes to almost everything the jerk pulled out, and within forty minutes, five outfits were secured.
"We can buy winter apparel later in the year," the jerk said, more to himself, "Next are shoes, then toiletries."
The teenager remembered the note and made a despairing noise — dinner suddenly seemed so far away.
***
"Hayakawa," Denji said with a lifeless voice, trailing after the jerk as they finally finished and left the mall. "I hate shopping."
"Let’s take a break," the jerk suggested, halting with the trolley behind his car. "Help me put the bags in," he said, pressing a button on his key that had the vehicle squeaking and lighting up, "and we’ll go eat."
Like magic, the teen’s lethargy disappeared. After the man opened the boot, he threw himself into the task.
***
"I noticed this earlier, but you don’t seem to like the TV," the jerk commented from the kitchen, where he was cutting the tags off Denji’s clothing. He had started quickly putting away the groceries once they returned, sending the blonde to the table with his pudding. When done, the brisk air around him had melted — now he was taking his time. "You even moved your seat."
Indeed, the teen was sitting with his back on the TV.
"It’s boring as hell," Denji answered around a mouthful of pudding. The blonde had wanted cake, but after the jerk became worried that the dessert would be too heavy for his stomach, the teen didn’t mind switching up.
The man wrinkled his nose briefly and raised an eyebrow. "So, you watch me instead? You could always change channels, you know."
Ah, he noticed. And then belatedly: what the hell are channels?
"So?" Denji challenged, not letting himself be cowed into embarrassment. He was also disinclined to admit to something he did not know when it was not necessary. "It’s not like it bothers you."
"Most people would be," the other said, but his face was unruffled, more thoughtful. "Though I don’t really care from a snot-nosed brat."
"Hey!"
"How—" the man paused, uncertain like he wasn’t sure he wanted to ask, before pushing forward, "How old are you anyway?"
"I’m sixteen," Denji replied, thinking nothing of it, and the blonde’s hand froze as the jerk’s face became stricken, a shadow falling over his eyes. The sight had the teenager’s heart plummeting hard in his chest. He hated how the other’s face changed — it made him uncomfortable, like watching a pup run into oncoming traffic. A sense of urgency filled him, impelling him to do anything, something, but his mind pulled up a blank.
The jerk raised his head, dark, empty eyes locking with his, and the other immediately softened, something warm sparking into those eyes as he noted, "Your way of eating has gotten a lot cleaner. I appreciate it."
The teenager grumbled wordlessly, unable to retort, and examined the jerk.
The other seemed fine now, moving on to unboxing the alarm.
He let out a sigh, too glad to really register that he had been troubled.
***
It should have been more unusual, Denji reflected, gaze moving from the dresser that now had a drawer and a half filled to the black-curtained window and the unmade bed, but integrating himself into the life and home of someone he knew for a mere few days happened so seamlessly.
And the reason behind this easy transition was the jerk, who had accepted Denji despite his many complaints because he was uptight, meticulous, and duty-bound, and dropping the ball too utterly would offend his delicate morals.
Denji had him figured out; that did not make the man any less frustrating to understand.
***
"So, if you’ll accept just one condition, I’m willing to overlook this incident. When I tell you to do something, you do it."
Ha, Denji thought automatically, fuck that.
Yet even as the teen offered vague, evasive words and radiated the untrustworthiness and insincerity of a sleazy door-to-door salesman, the jerk seemed to be giving Denji the benefit of the doubt as he left.
Denji grabbed another bunny apple slice, idly wondering why the man even bothered putting in the extra effort of cutting the fruit for him. To sweeten the deal for me, he brainstormed and subsequently rejected the idea — that dude did a lot of unnecessary shit for him regularly and, so far, had a decent track record of not holding any of it over his head, expecting repayment. It was probably some weird custom that ordinary people did; like saying set phrases before eating, you cut apples into bunnies for the hospitalised.
Denji bit down on the piece, relishing the tangy sugariness of the fruit. Well, the teenager mused, munching contently. If it’s him listening once or twice wouldn’t be too bad.