Page 132 of Kotori
"The shirt?" she asks.
I nod, lifting my left arm while she eases the fabric over my head. Her touch is tender, reverent almost, nothing like the charged encounters of our early days. This is care born of love, not seduction. Devotion, not submission.
She guides me to the washing stool first. Carefully, she helps me sit, then wets my skin with warm water from the shower attachment. Steam rises around us, carrying the scent of hinoki wood and soap as she lathers the washcloth.
"Let me," she says, beginning to wash my back with gentle, thorough strokes.
I feel my chest tighten with unexpected emotion. The first time we did this, I made her kneel. Made her understand exactly how powerless she was, how completely I owned every inch of her.
Now she tends to me as an equal, caring for me because she chooses to, not because she has to.
After she's finished washing my body and rinsing away all the soap, she helps me into the hot water with steady hands, making sure I don't slip or jar the healing shoulder. The clean water embraces me, hot enough to make my muscles relax instantly.
"Better?" she asks, settling on the wooden stool beside the tub.
"Yes." I sink deeper into the bath, letting the heat work into my damaged shoulder.
"Paige."
Her hands pause on my back where she's been washing with gentle strokes. "Yes?"
"At Tanabata." The words feel strange in my mouth, confession layered with vulnerability I'm not sure how to handle. "What did you wish for?"
She's quiet for so long I think she won't answer. When she finally speaks, her voice is soft, thoughtful.
"I wished to find where I belonged." Her hands resume their gentle washing. "I'd been drifting for so long, never really fitting anywhere. That night, with all those wishes hanging from the bamboo, I just wanted to find my place in the world."
The honesty in her voice makes my throat tight. "And did you? Find it?"
"Yes." No hesitation, no doubt. "Though not where I expected."
I lean back against the tub's edge, processing her words. She found her place. Here, with me, in this violent world that should have terrified her. She chose it. Chose me.
"What about you?" she asks quietly. "What did you wish for?"
The question hangs in the steamy air between us. I've never admitted it to anyone, never let myself think about it too directly. But sitting here, weak and dependent and cared for by this woman who sees exactly what I am and loves me anyway...
"I wished for you to choose me willingly. Not because you were trapped or scared or had no other options." The words feellike broken glass in my throat. "Because you wanted to. Because what we had was real, not just careful manipulation."
"Kaito," she breathes.
"I know what I did to you. How I broke you down, isolated you, made myself your only option for survival." I stare at my hands in the water, unable to meet her eyes. "I told myself it was necessary. That you'd understand eventually. That you'd thank me for showing you who you really were."
"You weren't entirely wrong about that," she says softly.
"Wasn't I?" I turn to look at her then, seeing my own uncertainty reflected in her face. "You became what I wanted you to become. But was any of it real? Is any of this real?"
She sets down the washcloth and moves closer, her hand finding my uninjured shoulder. "Look at me."
I do, seeing strength and certainty in her eyes that takes my breath away.
"You want to know what's real?" Her voice carries steel beneath the gentleness. "I stayed. I chose you when I learned what you really were. I fought for our family when you were too blind to see the truth about Daichi. I sat by your bedside for a week not because I had to, but because the thought of being anywhere else was unbearable." Her thumb traces small circles on my shoulder, touch gentle but grounding. "You think manipulation made me love you? Then you have a poor understanding of how love actually works." A small smile tugs at her lips. "Love doesn't ask permission, Kaito. It doesn't follow rules or logic or careful plans. It just is."
The certainty in her voice breaks something open in my chest. Months of wondering, of questioning whether what we built was real or just an elaborate prison of my own making, and she cuts through it all with simple truth.
"I love you," she continues. "Not the version of you that you think you created for me to love. The real you. The man who killsto protect his children. Who grieves for his wife but can't move past the guilt. Who's afraid of being vulnerable that he'd rather be hated than risk being rejected." She pauses with a chuckle. "That man who takes his kids on picnics and hauls them up mountains to visit shrines. The man who's raised three perfect girls like little princesses, even if he might have some outdated opinions."
I can't breathe. Can't process how she sees so clearly into the parts of myself I've spent decades hiding.
