Genma pivoted on his hips and lowered himself gingerly onto his back, easing the sheets and blankets over his injured leg and high enough to attain a semblance of modesty. “You’re the last person I’d ask to defend my virtue, Monkey-chan,” he said, aiming for light-hearted teasing. It came out tired and tentative. A year and a half ago Asuma would have shucked out of his pants and climbed under those covers with every intention of divesting them both of any virtue they had left between them.

A year and a half ago, when everything was different.

Asuma gave him a fond smile. “Assuming you have any virtue to begin with.” He tossed the re-assembled sack of medical supplies on the floor at the foot of the bed, and smoothed the blankets over Genma’s feet. “Go ahead and sleep. I'm gonna put the food away.” He hesitated a moment, then turned out the overhead light, leaving the room illuminated by a single, paper-shaded orange lamp at the bedside, and slid the door shut behind him.

Genma stared up at the wooden slats criss-crossing Aoba’s bedroom ceiling—the architect had evidently taken cues from traditional house-design when they built these flats. Lines intersecting lines intersecting lines. His and Asuma’s. His and his last team’s. His and Team Six’s. Intersecting trajectories that never converged… He let the heavy drag of the painkillers tow him under, with the lamp still casting low amber shadows across the slatted plaster. He was asleep before the echo of Asuma’s footsteps had died down the hall.