The Fire Lady

Chapter 7- I am done saving you

Chuuya's words are more sedating than the drink on her hand or the blunt she smoked a few hours ago. She should've bought more of it. At least to fill one more cigarillo. So, instead, Ozumi took one more sip of the bottle of scotch. The brownish glass tampering with the moon above her. The weather is getting colder. Ozumi embraced herself, bottle still in hand, all alone on the rooftop. Or at least she thinks so.

She doesn't notice Chuuya's arrival. Nor does she think about how he got up there with her. It's just that all of a sudden, he is there with her. The grimace on his face annoys Ozumi. He doesn't have to say it, she knows the words by heart. After the last few nights of hearing the same speech, she was bound to. No amount of drugs or intoxicity could make her stand Chuuya like this.

"Is this your life now?" Chuuya spats.

"Is it yours?"

Chuuya steps forward and leans slightly closer to her height, but backs away at the smell of her breath.

"You are overreacting." Ozumi accentuates every word that comes out of her mouth carefully.

"No, you actually stink of booze. And that's coming from me."

Even outside, Ozumi's chest is stuffed, like no more oxygen will enter her lungs. It is breezy and colder than usual. But it is like she is under direct sun hit in the middle of the desert.

"Just come back to the Port Mafia. This isn't a life!"

"Seriously, Chuuya, I'm too intoxicated to give a fuck." Ozumi takes a sip of her drink and leaves the mouth of the bottle hanging on her bottom lip, muttering into it. "And even if you are right, it's no excuse to be an absolute jerk."

"I thought you wanted to start a life anew. And that you wanted to make amends. What happened to that?"

"I don't know what I want."

"That's unfair." Chuuya speaks facing the ground. Ozumi lifts her gaze towards him, his expression hidden by the shadow of his hat. "I was actually looking forward to reconnecting with you. That maybe we could... Shit. I was actually happy to have you back. What is all of this all of a sudden?"

Ozumi moans and groans. Her hand holding the bottle falls into her lap.

"Why are you still talking?" her gaze fell to the city beholding them. "Goodness, I came back a few days ago and you're suffocating me."

"Why are you doing this?"

"Goddamn it Chuuya!" Ozumi raises her voice, overcoming all other sounds around them. The sharpness in her voice even deafness the passing plane. "What part of I don't know what I want that is so difficult for you to understand? Leave me be. I need to think. Far away from you."

"Don't say those things."

Ozumi brings her free hand to her face and massages her temples. As if she could think of anything else. Truth is that ever since she woke up, she still hasn't made a decision or had the right mindset to think about it. Her brain is foggy, it's been foggy for days. Her chest is stuffed. Her mind racing. She needs a release. Something to relax. That's when she found old friends in downtown bars. And old habits as well.

Ozumi doesn't notice Chuuya walking towards her, grimacing at the smell around her and kneeling before her. He grabs the back of her head and pulls her torso to his chest. His lips glued to her ear, he whispers,

"I hate seeing you like this." he finishes his words with a kiss on her head, right above her ear lobe.

Ozumi suddenly never felt the biggest of an urge to close her eyelids and sleep. She has no strength to fight it. In those mere seconds her body becomes limp on Chuuya's arms that hold her. His jacket smells of cologne, the same one he always wears ever since she had met him, and smoke. Her face relaxes on the soft fabric as her senses escape her.