Corpus Civilization

Brunei

Flitting around the room in a flurry that had only joined him in his most recent years, Razeen set up the house.

The meeting today had been decided for several days. The place, the time, the food; everything. It was a once in five years chance and they weren't about to give up. Appointments had been cancelled, food had been ordered, schedules had been cleared. They expected to spend the whole day together. They wish it could've been longer. Five years plus worth of stories couldn't fit in a day and night. Impossible to do that.

Razeen's house had been decided as the place where they'd all meet. It was the closest to all of them. Four of them would meet at the house and they would all go together to pick up Zyy from the airport. They'd come back, have some food, share some stories. That was the plan.

The bell donged through the entire house, echoing up the stairs, announcing an arrival. Wiping his hands on his pants, Razeen pulled at his fingers, panic slowly setting in. They were brothers. But he wasn't sure if he really wanted to see them anymore. Going around the huge dining table, he pauses in the kitchen, pulling off the lids of pots and dishes to confirm that yes, everything was ready, and yes, nothing needed garnishing. Oh! Except for the beef gravy! That needed garnishing.

Rushing over to the fridge, he pulls out a bundle of green onions, setting them down on the cutting board and dicing away. The bell rings again and still, he ignores it, humming an old song. The pile of diced onions grows, sticking to his fingers and leeching off their colour.

"You neglected me for onions?" a voice behind him calls.

Razeen jumps at the sudden voice behind him, brandishing the knife in his hand as a weapon.

The person dodges, jumping back into the far corner of the kitchen. It takes a moment for Razeen to recognize him.

"Zyy?"

"That's me!" the older man says, smiling a chipped tooth smile.

"Wait, I thought we were supposed to pick you up at the airport?" Razeen asks, brown eyes wide open as he hugs his older brother.

"I figured I'd give a surprise." Zyy replies, gently prying the knife from Razeen's fingers. He sets it down on the counter and returns his brother's hug. One pair of arms wrapped around soft muscle, the other around a scarred body. The males separate, staring at each other with love in their eyes before Zyy pulls away and takes up the knife.

The bell rings again, just as the knife hits the cutting board, chopping up the last of the green onions.

"I'll garnish the dish you need me to. You go open the door." Zyy tells Razeen, nudging him away with his elbow. "Don't keep them waiting."

Nodding hesitantly, Razeen steps away from the older man and heads outside, at the green gate that separates him and his brothers. Intaking another set of deep breathes, he unlocks the gate, looking up to see not one brother, but all three of them.

Before he can let out a gasp, Razeen is enveloped in three pairs of arms, one ruffling his brunette hair, the other around his shoulders and the last one just loosely slugged around all of them.

"Ayy! Look who's finally grown!" Kamito chuckles, still tweaking at Razeen's hair. Pushing off his hands, the youngest brings them inside, directing them to the dining table where the spread of food awaits them all. Zyy's already sitting at the head seat, hands clasped and a somber look on his face that peels away at their entrance. He smiles his fresh smile, shining brightly like...before.

"Come, my brothers! Let us eat!" Zyy yells and the rest of them burst out laughing, taking their seats on the long ends of the table, patting Zyy's shoulders on the way. They all sit down and Razeen passes the food around, pouring generous helpings on everyone's plates. Laughing at an occasional joke, they all dive in, enjoying the cooking more than they expected to. The older ones throw compliments around, all to make the youngest blush, Zyy sometimes jumping in to remind them that he helped too and that he "deserves some credit too". They discuss nothing of the past they spent together, instead choosing to stick with the time they spent separated.

It takes two minutes to clear the table and for them all to find a seat in the comfy couches of the living room. Jin and Sohel put up their feet, expressing their tiredness from having travelled so far, only for Zyy to comment that he'd come from even further. That brings up the topic of where he'd been in the first place. Zyy tries to deflect the topic at first, but four against one is the wrong fight to pick. He spills his story at last, starting from seven years ago, when he'd first applied for the military. Untold stories unfurl like leaves, told in hushed whispers to keep the suspense alive, each word drawing in the younger four like magpies at a shiny object.

Zyy's military stories end when he scratches his left leg and it comes off in his hands, which causes quite a few manly (not) screams. Zyy laughs heartedly at their expense, scratching his leg to its full extent.

Sohel quickly diverts the topic, avoiding the amputated leg with obvious distaste. He starts his story from six years ago, as he was the third to leave after Zyy and then Jin's departure. He explains his adventures in the jungle after someone found him with a clowder of cats and paid him to make friends with the bigger and more ferocious relatives of the felis catus. Then, proceeding to pull up his shirt, he shows off his vicious scars, a huge one tracing his entire abdomen. Razeen inspects the scar, mumbling incoherent words as he trails the pinkish skin. Zyy comments that the scar might even be worse than his own injury but Sohel doesn't joke back.

To change the topic before the awkward silence gets too much, Kamito announces the fact that he'd married. This causes hearty congratulations from all the brothers, large pats on the back that nearly cause the second oldest to fall over. He explains the story from six and a half years ago, when he'd gotten adopted, only to find himself married young with a wife just as young and inexperienced as him. They'd had a baby at their parents' forcing, a beautiful girl they'd named Hani, whom they loved with their entire hearts. At the baby's mention, there was an uproar that didn't calm down until Kamito pulled out his phone and showed off the pictures of his baby, which starts a cooing fest right next to his ear.

They take a dessert break, munching happily on the strawberry trifle while sly comments rise of the adventures they'd been told.

Jin, as usual, finishes first, clanking the spoon against his cup as he sets it down.

"I found my biological parents."

And the laughter in the room drops like all the air has been sucked out.

Jin spells out how he'd disappeared one day for an entire week, a story that even Razeen, who still lived at the orphanage at the time hadn't known. He describes how he'd found the records of his parents in the files hidden in the office of the orphanage. He'd taken the information and chosen to pursue what he could. He'd found his parents, seen over them for a day or two and then scrounged up the guts to introduce himself. They hadn't believed him until they'd found him still lingering the next day. His mother had burst out crying and enveloped him in her arms and his father had followed. They'd explained that the reason why he'd been left at the orphanage in the first place was that they had no financial system to support him. They wanted a better life for him. He'd brushed it off and returned to the orphanage, only for their words to plague him day and night. Finally, he'd packed what little he owned and left, showing up at the address written on the files. They'd welcomed him and he'd learned to live with a family that didn't contain only men. He mentioned that he had two little brothers which had surprisingly given him a warm welcome.

Jealousy and anger is what Jin expects from the rest, but when they congratulate and hug him, he melts in their arms, happy that they're not upset for leaving him. When the tears have evaporated, they all look at Razeen, the youngest, who has yet to share his story.

"I got adopted." Razeen starts. "Around the same time that you left," he says, pointing at Jin. he elucidates that the woman who'd adopted him had been old, but still filled with so much life. She's taken him in, fed him, clothed him. He hadn't cared that she was old. He came to love her. Three years with her and she finally told him about her coughing fits, the exhaustion spells, the things she'd hid from him. He'd cried then, and then he'd cried again a year later when she'd died. He'd cried even more when he'd found out that she'd left everything she ever owned to him. He was crying now, in the arms of the brothers he'd made through a shared experience, except these tears for something he'd gone through alone. They coddled him close, rubbed his back and offered comforting words, but none could be close enough to erase the loss from his heart.

When all tears had dried up, they all took a deep breath and took joy in the moment in which they were all here, together once more.

---

By Jem