Sundance

3. The magician's hat (Izuna)

Do you know what I found really annoying? When people thought it was easy. When people thought I was just born this way, and that I didn't have to work for anything. Well, it wasn't easy, no matter what form of joint malformation you were born with. I trained for eighteen hours a week.

I breathed through gritted teeth, trying to tell my muscles to relax. Softer... Softer... It's not dangerous... It's not dangerous... You do not need to contract to protect yourselves... I'm the only protection you need... I would never hurt you...

One mantra per breath.

I was in a front split position, my shiny violet latex bodysuit straining against my body, my front foot elevated by a tower of blocks to create an oversplit. The pain wasn't a problem per se, but the feeling of nausea it created was close to unbearable. But I wanted to stretch before each show to ensure my joints were warm. And since that was the only time I was allowed to stretch since it wasn't good for someone with hyper-mobile joints to do so, I wanted to do it properly. But I might have thumbed a bit on the rules of no stretching between shows since Madara...

I let my mind wander there. To the new discipline I had tried to add to my contortionist's number, to no success. After four hours in the practice tent yesterday, I had just sat down and cried, I had been so frustrated. I had hoped against hope that someone, anyone would come and hold me, tell me it was fine, that I was good, that the entire future of the circus wasn't on my shoulders. I wanted Hashirama to come. I wanted Madara to come. Maybe even...

But nothing. Nobody. Nobody came. I had cried alone.

Now, I was in the backstage area before the show, and I felt the presence above me before I heard his voice.

"Hi."

I kept my eyes closed.

"Push me", I demanded.

He stepped in behind me, put his magician's hat down, put his large hands on my tiny shoulders and pressed down, reinforcing my overspilt stretch. I hissed. He emitted a sigh that was so hot I had to meditate myself out of the moment; the purple latex costume was so tight it did not allow arousal. Instead, I focussed on the feeling of my hips opening up even more.

"Fuck, you're hot", he breathed.

I looked up. Hashirama was in his black tail-coat full of silver medallions and frills, his black trousers straining against his thighs, his hair loose and shiny, his eyelids made smokey by our makeup artist.

"So are you", I said.

He put a finger beneath my chin.

"My darling toy", he praised, almost purred.

"Other leg?" he asked.

"Already done." I came out of the split, stood up, bent my knee and grabbed the foot from behind to then pull it up behind me so the foot touched my head and further ahead, until I was in a standing needle oversplit. "Come to my room after the show. Do not change out of that costume."

He smirked, licked his lips.

Hashirama walked away; my contortionist's and hand balancing performance was the last performance while his hot magician's number was in the middle, so I would stretch my back while listening to music until it was my turn. Meeting Hashirama before a show was always a risk as I easily lost focus so now, I had to calm myself down. I closed my eyes when I felt done with the backbends, meditated the excitement away while sitting cross-legged. I thought of the complicated situation our relationship truly was, purely sexual for me, an irreversible love for Hashirama. We hadn't talked about it profusely, but we had scratched the surface. And that scratching had been so painful, we'd decided to leave it for now.