✧ RIP ✧

I made a fatal mistake. Realized too late I was touching the pillar, deeply cemented in his trap. Shit. Territory quirk? Poison? Miasma? My bicep struggles against it, something strong enough to crush a tree trunk rendered damn useless. So it ensnared at least all my contact against it. Would prolly spread. Just my luck. “Tch, what a pain in the ass.” Lifeless eyes vacillate between the cue stick and the floating pool balls. Then my eyes under the opera mask perk up and I laugh, real loud, belly deep at what he says. Was he serious? “Thanks for giving me that whole new lease on life, asshole. Christ must be real proud of you, ain’t he? You and your goody-good ■■■■ crusade.” An extra arm bursts over my right shoulder blade, cocks my gun in his direction. But not at him. My tone’s weirdly level, genuine!!

“I already did.”

To giving up crime or living, really, truly -

It was both. But to live is to die, and anyone worth their salt knows crime ain’t ever really done with you even if you’re done with it. I like his unexpected valiancy, tho.

At that moment, I shoot.

In the next fraction of a second, so much could have happened. He could have cleaved a few good holes right through my skull, knocked me senseless and utterly braindead onto my knees. If my shot made it through somehow before then, it’d land square in the hide of that killer car-sized axolotl. If luck was on my side, the not-so-lil alien fish would bulldoze over both of us in mindless rage, knocking me at least away from the pillar. Maybe he’d try to eat Ghouligan too!! After all, who wants to eat my rotting flesh?!

If I was alive, and not heavin’ on the floor in a puddle of brains, I’d yell out, “Just between you and me I think your work’s kinda tight!!” Slipping and sliding along the uneven floor - “We ain’t gotta have a problem!”

✧ RIP ✧

I lick my lips, a mischievous grin come alive at them!! “You, you supercute nerd!” My cheek was on fire where she kissed, the squeeze of my hand interlocked in hers the greatest feeling in all the universe. On God, how many years we’ve been together and I need it as badly as day one, like I’m staring all the way up at her in the Disney store even now. Then my dead eyes follow her crossed auric own, seeing them in our kids still somehow so surreal. The mini, perfect blend between the two of us. Sometimes, I just couldn’t look away. “Mm,” I so eloquently agree, mind gone blank when our lips touch and my hands greedily clutch her lower back. A lightbulb goes off in my head!! “Artsy, me?! I-I’ll take it, but your work’s a helluva lot prettier!” My cheek lingers in her caress, nose nuzzling the soft ridge of her collarbone. Summer cicadas hum behind us, sunshine kissing us above. I was happy to stay like that forever.

Infinite years long
I still love you fresh as dew
Water to cracked earth
chuck loves kaz

Zenji bursts out laughing at his mom’s expressions, Yuzuki taking a moment before she balls up in baby giggles too!! “That’s right, babies! Today’s the Star Festival!” I tickle their tums, helping taking them out the strollers. “You write wishes, anything, ANYTHING you can think of in this world, you can have! Anything you put your mind to. Nothing’s too great for you, Zenji, for you, Yuzuki!! Nothing in all this world!” I felt fatherly tears building up behind my eyeballs!! “Anyway, you put your lil baby hands like this n’ write ‘em all! Then we’re gonna hang ‘em on trees and they’ll come true!! Or I beat up whoever’s in charge of this whole thing.” I smirk, putting Yuzuki on my lap and very gently working a pencil into her tiny lil fingers. She half-gets it and I smile, putting my massive meaty hand over hers and holding the pencil over the paper.

When i die i see
a thousand one suns of you
Rest my soul in you
:chuckloveskaz:

“Can you guess your mama’s wish?” I faux-whisper to her. “I bet that it’s our lil ZuZus growing strong and healthy!! Or a full boatload of sushi!” A spare hand glides over Kazashi’s knee and all the way down her leg as I laugh!!

9 weeks
9 weeks and we were looking at
19 surgeries, he had no pulse and a heart where his brain should have been
Intestinal atresia. Omphalocele.
3 holes in his heart
Like the thug life found him early, took a bullet for daring to breathe
This state forbids abortion and
That’ll be a $50 copay ma’am.
It’s going to get worse.
He might take you on his way out
You can’t do it here but I know (a place, a guy. You’ll be back to yourself in days.)
But there’s no me without him.
(25 years, 14 weeks later and i think of him everyday).

Me and his papi yeah,
We’re in the ring with him
The news got us all wrong!
Poor Chilean parents?!
Ay dios mío!
I’m a dental hygienist! His papi works on the military base!
We can afford this
But not all this
News travels fast, surfs up to the shore of
A man so powerful he controls the tide.
He gets up on stage and,
promises the world to our son
who’s bound for hell
We fight like it
As the weeks pass like seconds and you hurl yourself
Into this big place of hurt and loathing.

I wanted you to live, above all
die with dignity, but not before
Your dewy eyes look into the freedom
Of being alive
Really, truly,
Stretch your scarves into open-faced palms
And leap into the sunshine with his scarred own
In your other.
This man, this monster
Promises operations and medical care not available to people who look like us, sound like us, have our orientation our history our ability our tax bracket our fight and toil to live in the capitalistic shithole he stands upon
(And we’re in a pretty damn good tax bracket, mijita. On the weekends I think of what you’re like, what brunch you like and what gossip we share between just the two of us. I’d spoil you.)
We lose the fight
But not baby.

If he experiences
What it is to love and be loved by someone so deeply air gushes through his broken lungs
Stillborn heart filling with blood
Without missed beats, wholeness so supreme
He forgets he ever thought himself less than
Unrelenting sheer
abounding
adoration -
For his every wish and serendipity taken human shape,
Divinely crafted,
Love of his life
Then and
Only then
May we find a semblance of solace.

(I’ve been sleeping well the past seven years.)
(Just who are you?!)

chuck’s mom loves kaz
everyone loves kaz!!

✧ RIP ✧

“Yeah you do, my lil nerd,” I tease, fingers sweeping over her nape, “saying the cutest things!!” I saw her look away, mesmerizing bliss bouncing around all funny behind my eyelids. Seeing her put her hand on her neck where I just kissed her made me wanna do it again, bad. A hotspot. Swear I’m wired for her every cell. I grin. “Nah.” I was already awake watching you sleep.

I’d never forget that drive, not in this lifetime or the next. Pulse gushing through my ears, my heart in my hands from across the passenger seat. Can’t even begin to say all the thoughts on my mind, but she was at the center, always would be, an infinite moon churning the tides of my soul. “Hella think so. I know so.” My voice is low as I squeeze her hand, take in her smile and the tears building behind her auric eyes. An extra arm curls around her shoulders, the fourth toting up a fist in victory! “She’s hella nice and the greatest surgeon Japan has EVER known!!” I ain’t know this, but if she could fix Antoine’s whack stinky ass she could do anything!! I beam up at my baby as I escort her out the car, words a rollercoaster frenzy of emotion and energy. This was it. We were admitting, our kids were popping out what felt like seconds from now!! If only my ass remembered how much time it’d usually take! “Hell yeah we will!” I scoop her up, so gentle, so hard. “I love you.” Always, forever. More than time can comprehend. “Let’s get it, baby girl!”

Nor could words describe the wave of relief that washes over me just seeing my cousin. Her calm, coffee in her hand, was magnetically enchanting. I squeeze my soulmate’s hand, eyes poppin’ outta my skull then for what my cousin said!! “T-the fifteenth couple?! WHAT THE ■■■■-” Not fighting her as I got carted off to the kitchen, I’d shout over my shoulders, “Confío en ti!”

Then I was staring up at bright lights. Kitchen cabinets. Not knowing what to do with myself. I’d been in dozens of raids, front lines of whatever the hell satan spat up that day. But waiting for the go signal all the way back then was a cake walk compared to this. I cross my arms, dumping myself into a chair in the corner table and squeezing my eyes shut. Might have muttered a prayer to the God I ain’t believe in, that everything was gonna be okay for my girl.

And our kids.

✧ RIP ✧

I was ugly grinning!! Her words, the gulp and blush that live on in infinite loop in my twisted head. It’s her, all her. That’s it, ain’t look twice at anybody ever again. Beauty in other girls was the facsimile of her smile, ink off a shade from the real thing. Just never compares, oceans away from her. I wanted her to feel the same way always, would keep myself sharp and strong till the day I died and hella in hell too!! She ain’t marry no scrub! I tug her all the closer to me in our group hug, careful to not squish our kids squealing with baby laughter!! “Rebels?! Awe shit, staying up late smokin’ cigs and cuttin’ class?!” Earth to me, karma’s a ■■■■!! “O-our sweet angels? No way, baby!! Y-you think they’ll be?” I lift up our son, eye his wriggling lil fingers and the iridescence dancing across his auric cross eyes. Horror strikes me as my mouth opens in a soft gasp. I hella already see it!!

I tug a strand of hair behind her ears with my index finger, thumb ridging up the base of her horns as she talks. Her words are hella beautiful. Then there’s her heart of melting magic, the intention and action of making a childhood so good for our kids that maybe their ancestors would feel it too. Maybe all this hell would be circumvented in a different lifetime because of what we were doing now, no evil dads nor their greed driving lifelong hatred. I nod up at her, sweeping in to press a kiss across her collarbone. My lips linger as I whisper across her skin. “The best of both worlds. You’re a lil bit better than me tho.”

“Yeah,” I reply back, “maybe thinkin’ to retire my swords, swap out my guns for somethin’!” If their skin was already blue, maybe it was an early indication they’d get regen too. Even if they did, there’d be no measure too great to protect our kids. I already hid all the weapons around the house but if they’re smart as I think they’re gonna be (or smarter than me which ain’t that hard to beat!!) then it wouldn’t be long till they got to ‘em!! There’s a name goin’ round… Bakuretsu. Apparently a high dealer of explosives. Ironic, right? I ain’t think I know her but I do!! Maybe she could make somethin’ compact and specially operated for me.

Anyway, I go draggin’ our catch to my beautiful family!! Grinnin’ up at my wife like a dog with a stick that it found, gashes across my torso and arms already repairing themselves. My eyes vacillate from my wife to our kids as they touch the shell and back again, light in the joy of their discovery. The whole world was so brand new to them, I ain’t think I’ll get used to that!! I get to the grill, then suddenly double over in “pain” as a hand goes to my stomach. “AHH!!!” The crab almost comes back to life for how loud my ass was!! “Kaz-chan, I desperately need-” I reach up for her- “a kiss!!”

✧ RIP ✧

My lips ache for more, teasing her pert dimples. Her smile just meant the whole world to me, the look in her eyes igniting me everywhere outside n’ where the sun ain’t touch!! “Oh yeah?” My arms twitch where she touches with her feather light grace. “Good thing baby!! You’ve given me a heart attack a billion times over!” I bite my lip when she cups the back of my neck, hands cradling her hip and lower back tighter to me before my lips melt against hers. It’s cotton candy sweetness and sunshine, those soft plump lips. I’d gladly die over and over again to kiss her like this, body burning everywhere still when she pinches my cheek. “Yeah.” I’m breathless, ugly grinnin’ still. Moon in my eyes, lit up my whole universe. “They’re gonna be hella somethin’.” they’ve got you in them, how could they not be the jewel of the world?

Happy shivers course through every stretch of me, skin pulled taut everywhere she touches. I wanna pounce. I’m hella more red and hot than blue and dead then, lifeless brain rottin’ over all things Kazashi McCoy. Having to keep my eyes on the road, images of her flash behind my eyelids at lightning pace, sin-crossed-unconditional love. I wanna love her. “I-I don’t mind, that’s really nice Zāzā,” I stutter in the moment, hella weak all over for her!! “Thank you baby,” I breathe out, “my superhott superbadass wife!! h-hey, just wait till we get home and I ain’t behind a wheel, a’ight?!” I wanna show you what you do to me. It rings happy lil bells in my tiny head when she kisses me back, soul ascending outside the earthly sphere, tied in red ribbons to hers.

My mouth grazes her fingers and hands long after, any excuse to extend our touch, to taste her. I chuckle, pulling back up after the stoplight to grip and cup her forearms. Massage up, then down in rhythms like the funny pitter-patter she made of my heartbeat. What she says puts the silliest, biggest shit-eating grin over my ugly mug!! “That’s crazy, baby,” I start, “cause I hella felt the exact same way ‘bout you!! Asked myself what God’s favor I earned by crossing your path or what spell someone cast upon ya to see me like you did.” I still sometimes lay awake at night, wondering if it’s all a helluva trip. One long dream, a conky fantasy of a nerdy queen who somehow falls for an ugly troll. Makes me scared to sleep, y’know? Cause if I woke up and that was true, n’ I ain’t know her at all, ain’t make all these gorgeous memories in 3D with a nymph I’d been so blessed to call my own - I ain’t know what I’d do with myself. She was my reason, n’ all I wanted to do with my life after crime was love her silly!! So when she squeezes my hand, so flustered it was gut-bustingly cute, I can’t help but wrap her tighter in my arms and nuzzle my face to hers!! “I can keep going!!” I tease, heart on fire with what she says. Then my voice is real, promises spoken aloud between us. “There’d be no me without you.”

I blush when she says she’ll bring the red lipstick next time!! “My weakness,” I groan out, “hell, everything you wear or don’t wear!!” I was laughing, at this, at her sticking her tongue out at me all hella cute-like!! There’d be no doubt we’d laugh like this together till we were eighty-years-old and counting! It’s the beauty of my moongirl, the fire she lights up inside me. Then my heart melts all over again hearing what she says. Stealing my heart… “It’s all yours. Forever.” I lean over and up to give her a big fat kiss over her neck, cherish the softness of her skin against my lips. “I’m deadass ready to prove the same at any moment!! Just try me, baby!” With an extra arm, I flipped out my jackknife, aiming it towards my chest like I’d cut out my own heart!! Just kidding. It was over and gone, been between her silky soft fingertips since she said sorry at the Disney store.

Those minutes with this psychopath pass like hours. All the while, I was thinkin’, wonderin’ what my girl was processin’ bout this whole situation. I hated myself for dragging her into my underworld; and knew shamefully this ain’t the last time. There was always room for some new loose end, some new deal that had to be made metaphorically or in reality. And now that we were having kids?... How could I possibly get the biggest distance between them and the underground hell I’d been inured in? My head was spinning with promises, lines of action. I’d put a whole galaxy between this asshole and my babies and wife, seven billion trillion light years till he ever comes close to us! And by that time, our kids would be grown with their own superstrong kids and grandkids!!

Plans were instantaneously made. I was seething, pull her tight to me in her big hug. Hearing the shakiness of her voice broke something in me. “No no no Kaz-chan,” I coo, arms slung warm and heavy over her shoulders, “I’m sorry. That was all whack as hell. I-I’m going to take care of all this, okay? We’re gonna get our house then never see this asshole ever again.” I’d walk us to the car, help her in despite our location and throttle away at breakneck pace. All the while holding onto her, curling her fingertips into mine like two halves of a heart, beating.

If only it were so simple.

✧ RIP ✧

I was ugly cacklin’!! Then sighing… “One day they’re gonna find out just what kinda delinquents we are, ain’t they?” I couldn’t wait to randomly drop lore on our babies, mega downloads of how their old man’s old man bribed his high school into letting him in… only for their old man to drop out anyway. And I wouldn’t change a thing ‘bout it, cause every choice in the end got me closer to the love of my life. All the misery and mistakes, lessons, all worth it. Plus, better they find out the shit from me than anywhere else!! I lean up and in to kiss her when she tells them what she does, lips lingering over those full, sumptuous lips. There’s a certain magic to my moongirl I just ain’t ever gonna get used to, like every time it’s vibrantly new. Parenting carried a lotta new things, made me fall in love with her all over again in these lil moments. Like a diamond turned to a different side, a whole new perspective of beauty I ain’t seen before.

N’ I couldn’t tear my eyes away from her either when she talked about the collab, asked them what they thought of me!! Melted my heart damn near on the spot! “Your daddy loves YOU!” Isn’t that word so ■■■■ing weird now?? “Good plan, baby!” Lit my heart afire when she mentions our teamwork, squeezes my hand. I’m invincible with her, our kids. Ain’t nothin’ gonna stop us. I scoop ‘em both up, leaning down to nuzzle their faces and kiss their eyes under their masks. They’re cooin, gurglin’ hella, even when we’re sailing down through the air!! My girl transitions from a wingsuit to a badass plate of heavy armor wicked fast, givin’ me whiplash for how hard I was gawking at her!!

REEERUGH! the enormous shark wails, avalanching backwards as a wave of sand went with it. “HOLY ■■■■!! YEAH beat his ass hun!! Look kids, your mom’s takin’ names!” Split seconds before making contact with the ground, I’d bring up my leg, slamming it down on the adjacent shark. It heaves, violently opening up its maw before I sprinted towards it to jump kick it. An unusual wave of aching coasted through my thigh - I never skipped leg day but never entered a fight without my fists! “Whew! Guess I’m gonna get real good at kickboxin’, ain’t I?” Kids in arms, I’d turn towards her.

SAVE ME!!

“G’on! I got your back!” I was all eyes all around us, hoping to knock down any threat that came her way!