Daisuki

by Hildred Billings

  “I had something to do.”

  Aiko turned. “Oh? And what was that?”

  “Nothing special.”

  Dear God, she’s cut off her coworker’s testicles and thrown them into the bay.

  Aiko arranged the chopped vegetables into rows to throw into the skillet. Before she could reach over and turn on the stove, however, Reina snuck up behind her and hugged her, teeth nipping at her ear.

  Under most circumstances it would’ve been nice, maybe dazzling, but Aiko’s stomach growled and demanded lunch. She shrugged Reina off her, the stench of sweat wafting into her nostrils. “Ara! You smell awful!” She smacked Reina on the arm. “Go change!”

  “Fine.” Reina slunk back into the living room, her fingers dancing atop the first button on her cotton work shirt. “Oh, by the way, there’s a cockroach on the living room table.”

  “Uso!” Aiko swerved around again, gaping into the empty space Reina left behind. A cockroach! Aiko tiptoed to the living room entrance, prepared for the disgusting inevitable. Why didn’t she do something about it? She likes killing things!

  Reina was already absent from the living room. Aiko glanced around the carpet and the shelving in the room to make sure no cockroaches lurked there. I don’t see anything. Aiko stepped into the room and approached the table. Just like her to make a stupid joke like that. Ugh!

  However, as she got closer to the table she noticed a dark, immobile spot on it that was not there before. Aiko froze and waited for it to scuffle across the table, antenna jiggling and germs spreading.

  But it didn’t move. When Aiko crept closer, she noted it wasn’t a bug at all, but a little black box.

  “Nani kore?” She bent down and picked it up. Whose is this? It can’t be Reina’s. A black felt box, belonging to Reina? Aiko would’ve laughed if she weren’t so confused.

  She looked it over top and bottom before attempting to open it. It wouldn’t budge, and before she could roll her eyes and toss it back on the table she noticed the latch once overlooked. Aiko popped open the lid.

  A golden wedding band.

  Her breath caught in her throat, in her chest, in the pit of her stomach as she stared down at the ring as if it were a hundred million yen. “Re…Reina!” She spun around and there Reina was, standing in the entryway looking not so smug anymore. The tenderness in her face was as golden as the ring in Aiko’s hand.

  Aiko couldn’t speak. Her brain looped around and around from “Is this another joke?” to “Is the world ending?” and back again. She waited for Reina to say something first, but all she did was look away and redden a little.

  “Reina!” Aiko held the box out to her as she waltzed up. “What is this?”

  “Maa…I wonder?”

  Her blasé countenance told Aiko everything she needed to know. All the life sucked out of her head and left her feeling woozier than if it were possible for Reina to impregnate her. She compensated by emitting a high-pitched whine of excitement.

  “Yaaa!” Aiko hopped up and down and clasped her hand against her mouth to contain more squeals. She gazed into the box and admired her new ring, the one token she dreamed of since she was a child.

  My wedding ring.

  “Well, are you going to put it on or are you just going to keep staring at it?”

  Aiko floundered some more while she attempted to regather her bearings, but it was like trying to summon a pack of children told they would go to Disneyland. My wedding ring! She found the ability to pick the ring out of the box and admire it in the light of the living room, its gold reflecting enough to alert her to an inscription on the bottom of the band. She peered at it and made out the Japanese kanji for “I love you.”

  Sinking to her knees, Aiko turned into a complete and utter mess of tears and happy wails. Reina gave a start and reached down to haul her to her feet again, all the while telling her, “If I had known this would be your reaction, I would have…”

  Aiko flung herself around Reina and kissed her a dozen times across the chest, her tears mingling with sweat until her entire face was smeared in moisture. Reina tsked in pain and pried her off. “Give me that!”

  She took the ring from Aiko and, while the little lady kept her hand across her mouth and stared down at her own left hand, Reina found the appropriate finger and slipped the ring on. As the metal struggled to push against Aiko’s expanded skin, she began to melt into another puddle of happy-little-homemaker.

  “Reina!” The only word she could say. “Reina! Reina!”

  “Nan darou na?” Reina put a hand against Aiko’s cheek. The most wonderful hand in the world. “You like it?”

  “Sou! Sou!” Aiko nodded so hard she knocked the remaining tears out of her eyes. “Thank you so much!”

  “What are you, an acquaintance?” Reina took her left hand and held it between them. “Who would ever believe you were my wife, acting like that?”

  Hearing her say those words – “My wife!” – sent Aiko into one last spiral leading her straight into Reina’s waiting embrace. “I love you so much, Reina-chan!” She nuzzled her cheek against the cotton of Reina’s shirt. Eventually she tilted her chin up and asked, “But if I’m the wife, what does that make you?”

  Reina shrugged. “Whatever we want me to be.”

  “Do you have a ring too?”

  A scowl. “Let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves.” Aiko also frowned, and Reina went for a quick recovery. “I was thinking that maybe I would take time off at Christmas, for our twentieth anniversary.” Aiko could already feel a new heart attack coming on. “You always wanted to go to America and see our friends there. Well, we can…you know…”

  “Oh my God, Reina!” Was this the happiest day possible? “Are you saying that we…are you asking…?”

  “Asking you what? You’re already my damn wife.” Reina reddened even more, nonetheless. “All I did was get you a ring to show off to everybody!”

  “You proposed to your wife!”

  “Maybe I did.”

  “How can you propose to your wife? Is it like renewing vows? We never had vows before!”

  “I don’t know! Don’t complicate it!” Reina slackened her hold. “I swear!”

  “Oh, Reina, I love you!” Aiko leapt onto Reina, pushing her against the entryway and smashing her legs against the wall. Aiko struggled to wrap her legs around Reina, but before she could get that far her thigh bumped into something obtrusive at Reina’s midsection.

  The room fell silent as Aiko glimpsed down. “Are you…are you wearing a…”

  “Maybe.”

  “Why?”

  “Why not?”

  Aiko gazed into Reina’s eyes, where mischievousness played and a hidden sentimentality lurked. “Were you wearing that all day?”

  Reina said nothing, but her smile widened.

  “You naughty girl!”

  She bent down and kissed Aiko on the mouth before she could say anything else. Aiko fell back into bliss, her brain jumping between felicity and arousal as if they couldn’t be the same thing.

  Aiko pulled away and snuck her lips up to Reina’s ear. “I wanna go upstairs!”

  She laughed. “I thought you might say that.” And with a mighty lurch she lifted Aiko off the ground.

  Something about a lunch, about vegetables, about an entire world outside of “them” as they ascended the stairs, but none of that mattered anymore as Aiko’s hunger for food turned into a hunger for Reina, her wife, her husband, her one-and-only partner for life. None of that mattered anymore once Reina dropped her on their bed and fell on top of her, their kisses heavy and their touches everywhere. None of that mattered when Reina pushed aside Aiko’s hair and whispered into her ear, breath hot, coarse, and full of love as she spoke.

  “Daisuki.”

  Hildred Billings is a Japanese and Religious Studies scholar who has spent her entire life knowing she would write for a living someday. She has lived in Japan a total of three times in three different locations, from the h
eights of the Japanese alps to the hectic Tokyo suburbs, with a life in Shikoku somewhere in there too. When she’s not writing, however, she spends most of her time talking about Asian pop music, cats, and bad 80’s fantasy movies with anyone who will listen…or not.

  Her writing centers around themes of redemption, sexuality, and death, sometimes all at once. Although she enjoys writing in the genre of fantasy the most, she strives to show as much reality as possible through her characters and situations, since she’s a furious realist herself.

  Currently, Hildred lives in Oregon with her cat, with dreams of maybe having another human around someday.

  Connect with Hildred on any of the following:

  Website .:. Twitter .:. Facebook .:. Tumblr

  REN’AI RENSAI is an ongoing look at one couple’s lesbian relationship over the span of decades. Below is a short list of other titles currently available and those that are coming soon!

  AVAILABLE NOW

  “HATSUKOI.”

  (Novel)

  A young Japanese woman falls in love with a philandering lesbian.

  “SEIKOU.”

  (Novel)

  Three months of wedded bliss later, Reina is on the verge of her biggest breakdown yet. Between her gender dysphoria, lonely boss, hostile in-laws, and a young couple in constant need of her “help,” Reina’s about to drag her wife Aiko down their darkest hole yet.

  “MITSUSHIN.”

  (Short Story)

  As a Valentine’s Day gift, Reina decides it’s time to introduce her girlfriend into the wonderful world of menage.

  “NANPAKAI.”

  (Short Story)

  For her birthday Aiko is taken to a risque nightclub, where she’s expected to seduce a random stranger.

  “CHINSEKI.”

  (Short Story)

  A menage with a new friend forces Reina to reconsider her attractions and jealousy meter. Continuation of “NANPAKAI.”

  COMING SOON

  “SHIMONETA.”

  (Short Story)

  When Reina is roped into giving a sex seminar in front of a dozen young women, she ends up with an unlikely student - her wife!

  “TOKOIRI.”

  (Short Story)

  Love is in the air on Aiko and Reina’s wedding day. Too bad it falls to pieces when Aiko comes down with a case of wedding night jitters!

  “KATAOMOI.”

  (Novel)

  After moving in with Reina, Aiko becomes determined to make friends again. However, the group she becomes involved with has one member who is not impressed with her - Reina’s ex-girlfriend!

  For new release information, please join the mailing list!

  The following is the first scene from “HATSUKOI.” book 2 of REN’AI RENSAI, available now from Barachou Press at all major ebook retailers.

  If society has taught Aiko anything, it’s that one day she will marry a man. Not until she meets Reina, a lesbian with a knack for flirting, does she decide she wants to experience a different kind of sexual liberation – assuming she can overcome her insecurities and nosy family. As she succumbs more and more to Reina’s charms, however, Aiko wonders if she can really abandon everyone’s expectations.

  Reina has met plenty of girls like Aiko before: cute, naive, and ready to screw the status quo. After being burned by countless young women who go on to marry men and forget their lesbian lives, how can Reina trust yet another “good girl” following her around? Especially when she thinks she may be having those foreign feelings for her best friend instead.

  Time will only tell if Hatsukoi, or “first love,” has really come to two such different people. Is their relationship genuine or just another footnote amongst flirting, lying, and sneaking around love hotels?

  Tokyo; December 10th, 1992

  Somewhere, Aiko’s favorite song played on a stereo.

  Her ears followed the pop-rock sounds to the corner of the room where two girls huddled around a mirror, applying makeup. Aiko turned to her cousin Shizuka and waited for her to proceed with the tour and introductions. It was Aiko’s first time to see the backstage of a music theater, and she didn’t want to embarrass herself or get her cousin in trouble.

  She always thought such a scene would be alight with human energy, but the few staff members wandering around yawned behind limp hands. A costumer pushed a rack of colorful sequined dresses across the room and was followed by everyone else, except for the two girls still applying. Aiko recognized their dresses as the same style Shizuka wore.

  “Are those your group mates?” she asked.

  Shizuka nodded with the same dead energy. “Two of them, anyway.”

  “Is one of them the American?”

  “Well, one of them is American.” Shizuka blinked. “No, not the one I told you about. The other one is blond.”

  “There are two Americans?” Aiko had heard about one, a pale blonde with a high voice and a sordid reputation, if sarcastic cousins were credible. “How lucky!”

  “Yeah, lucky. They talk in English behind our backs. Well, fight is more like it.” Shizuka took a step further into the light. “Come on, I’ll introduce you to the nicer one.”

  Although she sauntered through the room without a worry, Aiko took more care to ensure she didn’t step on a forgotten feather or bump her head against the cords hanging from the ceiling. This place is so amazing. Every time she watched a live music show on television, she wondered what the places the talents retreated to offstage were like. Now that she had a cousin in the entertainment industry, it was like Christmas came three weeks early.

  “Yo!” Shizuka called as they approached the duo of bandmates. “If you two aren’t careful, you’re going to kill our make-up supply and piss off the manager.”

  One of the women dropped her eyeliner and craned her head around, revealing Western face framed with bobbed brown hair. “Is there a problem?” Aiko was surprised the foreigner spoke Japanese well. “Or are you jealous we got the new stock before you?”

  “Oh, please.” Shizuka smiled. “Ai-chan, this is my fellow forgotten backup singer, Michiko.” She stepped out of the way so Aiko was unexpectedly presented on a bashful platter. “She’s the other American I just now told you about.”

  Michiko also smiled and extended a hand to Aiko. “Hajimemashite,” the American greeted. “What’s your name?”

  The giddiness over getting to shake hands like a “real” foreigner was enough to make Aiko beam, although her eyes kept pointed to the ground. “Hajimemashite,” she said, and gripped Michiko’s soft hand. Aiko pulled it away again before her shyness could overcome her. “My name is Aiko. Aiko Takeuchi.”

  “Oi!” Shizuka smacked the other woman on the shoulder. “Don’t be rude!”

  “Eh?” The woman in blue spun around. Vibrant eyes shrouded in thick eyeliner stared at Aiko, dissecting her, judging her.

  Aiko didn’t know why another Japanese girl’s face shocked her so much. Maybe it was the eyeliner, or the eyes – upon reflection later in life, Aiko would gauge it was a combination of those eyes alongside the sleek and long, black hair making her heart still in her chest. This woman looked like a veritable Cleopatra.

  She did not, however, talk like an Egyptian ruler.

  “Mou, Shi-chan, why’d you bring a little girl in here? We just practiced for three hours and I’m tired.”

  “You’re a dog,” Shizuka bit with a sharp tongue. To Aiko, she said, “This is Reina. She sings well but is all sorts of gross.”

  “Yeah, well, fuck you too.” But Reina grinned, and confusion swam in Aiko – perhaps from the rough and coarse words coming out of such a dainty mouth. Reina’s vocabulary made her sound like the tough boys at Aiko’s old high school.

  Shizuka responded with a thump on Reina’s shoulder, and soon the group mates laughed in unison while Aiko stood in perplexity. They must be really close. She never took her cousin as somebody to laugh at another woman’s crudeness, but this world she worked in was different from everyday society.
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  As the laughing died down, Reina pulled out a carton of cigarettes and passed one to Michiko. Shizuka further surprised Aiko by reaching out to take one as well – since when did she smoke? Did her mother know? Before the lighter in Michiko’s hand sparked to life, the cigarette carton appeared in hand’s reach.

  “Ii yo.” Reina shoved the carton at Aiko again. “Ah, let me guess, you don’t smoke.”

  Aiko shook her head as Reina leaned back and took a light from Michiko. Soon three plumes of smoke wafted around Aiko’s head and made her swoon; she wasn’t sure if the high was from second-hand smoke or from seeing Reina wrap her tongue and skinny fingers around a cigarette. Men who smoked were disgusting and inconsiderate, but something about a woman crossing her legs and pursing her lips made Aiko double-take.

  “Figures.” The smoke lingered around Reina’s face, obscuring her thin eyes. “You’re a good girl, I bet. You don’t smoke, get drunk, or fuck.” When the smoke cleared Aiko could see Reina’s eyes searing, daring her to respond.

  “Oh, shut up and leave her alone. Don’t listen to her.” Shizuka took another draft of her cigarette. “This one never stops thinking about sex.”

  “Hey, at least I get some.”

  “I told you, I’m not interested in women.”

  Throughout this small exchange, Michiko kept a curious eye on Aiko and her reactions. Now, upon both the declaration of Reina’s passive thoughts and her assumptions about Shizuka, Michiko studied Aiko’s face as if she had a second nose.