Work Text:
December 10th
The air was cold, though nothing like the snowy days Hanzo remembered from his youth in Japan. He recalled fondly the pastel beauty of snow upon Sakura, a sight now replaced with mild winds and a clear landscape.
He never had much time to truly enjoy it between training sessions and clan meetings and desperately trying to keep Genji in line, but often his few moments of peace were found staring out of his bedroom window and watching delicate flakes drift from the clouds.
Even now that yearning for comfort has not abandoned him, though he no longer searches for it in the form of a silent snow. Now his safe harbor is in the form of two little girls he could have never imagined for himself.
At one point it had been in the shape of a cowboy with a smile like the sun and lies like arsenic on his lips.
Hanzo knelt next to Akiko, absently reading over details of his next mission while she made her Christmas list. The lists weren’t something Hanzo himself had done growing up, but Cole had instilled it into her as a tradition that Hanzo wasn’t quite willing to break, particularly because it was one of her favorite activities leading up to the holidays. Anything that allowed him to pretend that their home wasn’t burnt to the ground, in every way possible. Ahmya was with the cowboy and Fareeha, having refused to settle until her other father had come to collect her.
It felt near impossible to keep his mind from straying to his husband. Ex-husband, as he was so brutally reminded every time he saw his discarded ring in his bedside table drawer. Every time he smelt the alcohol on Cole’s breath, or his clothes, or saw the lie in the cowboy’s eyes when he insisted that his drinking wasn’t a problem. His reverie was (thankfully) interrupted by Akiko poking him on the arm.
“Tou? ‘M done.”
Hanzo smiled, happy to see at least some semblance of the happy little girl Akiko had been before the night they were forced from their home and into what seemed like a neverending state of uncertainty. He saw how this weighed on her, how she was crawling back into the shell they had barely gotten her out of, he felt it like an open wound. He’d missed it.
He missed Cole. He missed talking to him before bed, watching him play with Akiko and knowing that he trusted someone like he’d never trusted before. Stolen kisses between diaper changes, arguing over stupid shit because they both knew that none of it really mattered, that it was them to the end of the line. Knowing that he could relax for the first time in his life, learning to love until it was as simple as breathing.
“Very nice. I will have to send this to Santa, yes?”
“Will you make extra, extra sure he gets it? ‘S really in-important.”
“Yes, I will make sure he gets it. I promise. I will go to the North Pole myself to hand it to him personally if I must,” he replied with a smile, pressing a gentle kiss on Akiko’s head. “Now, I believe you are having dinner with a certain Uncle Genji, correct? Let’s get you dressed.”
Dinner with Genji was more of an excuse to finally have a moment to breathe than anything. Hanzo loved his daughters, would move heaven and Earth at the slightest suggestion from them, but the kind of exhaustion he had been subjected to was not one he was capable of hiding 24/7. Genji had been a saint, a blessing Hanzo still could not believe he was allowed. If he thought too hard about it, though, he knew he would fall back into the guilt spiral he had become familiar with all those years ago. It was better, easier, for him to believe Genji had been so generous simply for the sake of his nieces and not his fratricidal older brother.
It wouldn’t be far-fetched to say Hanzo was falling apart. He had unlearned being lonely just to have it forced back upon him by the one person he really trusted. Hanzo spent his nights in a too-cold, too-big bed forcing back tears because he couldn’t let himself fall any further and spent his days trying to keep himself too busy to think. He had forced himself back to his feet after what Reaper had done to him because it drove him crazy to trust anyone else with his daughters. If Cole, his husband, his best friend, his anchor, could betray him so thoroughly what was stopping anyone else?
He shook his head as if physically clearing the thought, forcing another smile onto his face and standing with Akiko’s letter still in his hand. His free one was taken up by his daughter’s little fingers, grasping his as though she was scared he would drift away. The fear wouldn’t be unfounded.
…
Later, when he was finally left alone, he sat on his bed and opened Akiko’s list.
Devastation was not the right word.
No list was written, no wishes for toys or crayons or anything else he would have expected from Akiko. No. There, in the messy writing of a too-young child, was a set of scribbles acting as a “Dear Santa”. Below that, a drawing that cut into Hanzo like a knife. Two figures, holding hands, one with a shoddy interpretation of a cowboy hat and the other with hair like Hanzo’s.
The desperate plea of a child for her parents to go back to the way they used to be, to hold hands and have the capacity to love each other (and her) the same as before.
The tears crashed over him like a tidal wave, eroding the hard exterior he kept around himself like it was made of sand. Below that, a desperation so intense it filled his lungs, it clogged his veins, it drowned out every other thought and all he was left with was the sense that he had failed in every way possible.
As a son, as a brother, as a husband, as a father.
How could he have done this to her? How could he have not noticed what was going on before it was too late? A year ago, he would have told anyone that he knew Cole like the back of his hand. But he’d been wrong. He’d been wrong, and now he lived with that mistake. He lived avoiding the eye of the love of his life.
He was angry, he was so mad at Cole that it was a wonder he hadn’t really, truly, lost his temper with him. Angry that he’d been lied to for so long, angry that Cole couldn’t just step away from the bottle, angry because despite all of it he still loved the damn man.
But underneath, at his core, in his soul, was guilt. A guilt that had become a part of him twelve years ago and remained his biggest tormentor. As he stared at that drawing, as he imagined Akiko right beside him feeling what she must have felt to even conjure up something like this, he had never hated himself more.
First, he had killed her real father. Taken her from her home, and let her learn happiness just to rip it away from her due to his own selfishness and ignorance. He knew, he knew, that Cole had been hiding something from him. Before anyone told him, before he nearly lost his life, he had known. Maybe if he had said something, maybe if he had pushed harder, been more attentive, this could have all been prevented. But he hadn’t said anything because he trusted Cole to tell him, like a fool.
Hanzo had never grown from the ignorant brat he had been raised as, and now everyone else was paying for it.
How could he seek redemption for this? He had never quite believed in karma, not really, but surely there was a price to pay. Maybe this was it. Maybe the price was this all consuming hatred for himself, the dread stealing his breath. Maybe the price had been losing the love of his life and watching his daughter suffer.
Hanzo’s body shook with the force of his regret and despair, hands clenched so tightly around the paper in his hands it was a wonder he hadn’t ripped it. Everytime he managed to get a hold on his thoughts, his eyes went back to what Akiko had drawn and the cycle repeated. A particularly dark part of him wished Genji had won their fight all those years ago, if only so Hanzo wouldn’t have to endure this.
But he didn’t have the time to sit in this pool of suffering much longer. He still had to get Ahmya, had to relieve Genji of Akiko so they could get ready for the night. How was he meant to look at Cole after this?
Should he tell him? Should he subject the cowboy to the same sort of helplessness he was feeling, allow him to see the depths of what had become of them? He wanted to keep it to himself, to hold it close to his chest because he knew as much as this was hurting him it was also a vulnerable part of Akiko on that paper. Maybe that was why Cole should see it, but the fact was Hanzo simply did not trust him like he used to
It’s not like he could ask anyone. Not Genji, who was arguably more angry at Cole than Hanzo was. And who else was there?
It wasn’t like anyone at the Watchpoint had been openly hostile to him, that wasn’t the problem. In fact, he would consider himself and Dr. Zhou something akin to friends. But the walls he had built around himself were too high and too thick to let anyone in. This in particular was something he couldn’t bear letting anyone see, his shame too great and fear too present.
Eventually, after who knows how long of deliberating, a beeping brought him back into the present. His communicator was going off, likely Genji or Cole asking him about getting the girls.
His suspicion was confirmed when he saw a short message from his ex-husband.
“Ahmya’s getting tired. Heading over there now for bedtime. Akiko still with Genji?”
Hanzo clenched his hand around the communicator. The sting of the way they spoke to each other now would never leave, as sharp and present as it was in those first days after their separation. There was no fondness present now, nothing teasing or sweet.
He shoved the thought into the furthest corner of his mind and responded with an equally formal message.
“She is still with Genji. I will see you soon.”
He wasn’t given very much longer to think, a knock on the door breaking his train of thought not even five minutes later. Putting the paper on his nightstand, Hanzo took a deep breath and tried to ready himself to suffer through another conversation saying none of the things he truly wanted to say.
As he approached the door, he forced himself to make his expression blank. Or at least as close to it as he could get without seemingly outwardly hostile. He opened the door and came face to face with familiar brown eyes and tan skin.
Hanzo hated how the cowboy could still knock the breath from him. He’d never let himself admit it, would never let Cole see him bared like that again, so he acted like the air hadn’t left the room and he greeted the stranger he’d once shared a life with.
“She seems to be doing better than when I last saw her. How was today?”
His tone was carefully neutral, toeing the line between cold and indifferent despite the fact what he felt was anything but.
He could see the hurt in Cole’s eyes, saw the way his expression shuttered when he realized over and over again that Hanzo was serious about them being done. So he turned his heart off and relied on his head to get him through these minutes of tortuous small talk.
“It was jus’ fine. Didn’ take long to calm her down this mornin’, think she jus’ missed her daddy. Akiko gonna be back soon?”
Hanzo held out his arms for Ahmya, a tumultuous part of him calming when his fingers touched her soft skin. He cooed gently at her before responding to Cole, arms secure around their daughter.
“I was going to go get her from Genji soon. I didn’t realize you would be bringing Ahmya back now.”
Cole nodded in response, hands in his pockets and a carefully neutral expression on his face. He hated this. Hated feeling the wall between them but knowing it was necessary, feeling their relationship break more and more with every tense conversation or exchange.
Hanzo decided then that he would give Cole Akiko’s drawing. Their marriage may be nothing more than a memory, but that didn’t mean the cowboys relationship with their children needed to have the same agonizing distance.
“I have something I have to give you,” he started, walking further into the quarters and gesturing for Cole to follow him. He set Ahmya down gently on the floor, letting her entertain herself with a toy (Cole watching, of course) while he grabbed Akiko’s paper.
Hanzo walked back out to the living area, feeling oddly like he was a juror carrying a guilty verdict. He handed it to Cole silently, instinctively grabbing the other man’s hand when he went to open it. The archer quickly jerked away as if burned, hands falling to his sides instead.
“Just…don’t look at it until you are alone.”
It was a small mercy, allowing Cole the dignity of falling apart (as he surely would) by himself. Hanzo stubbornly pushed away the thought that whiskey would be the cowboy’s companion that night, replacing the archer. A curious expression passed over the cowboy’s face, fingers twitching on the “list” he held like he was considering ignoring Hanzo’s warnings, but eventually decided against it.
“What is it?”
“Akiko’s Christmas list,” he said eventually, pointedly avoiding Cole’s gaze.
The cowboys confusion didn’t fade in the slightest, but he listened to his ex-husband (for once) and put the paper in his pocket.
And there they stood, an ocean between them when they used to share a tide. It was the agony of a laugh that used to be only for you, the discontent of seeing your hometown as though through the eyes of a stranger. Hanzo forced his gaze away from the disheveled cowboy before him, unable to bear anymore.
“Genji should be here with Akiko soon. You can start getting Ahmya ready for bed while I wait for them,” Hanzo said, voice not quite soft but not quite cold.
Cole nodded, opening his mouth as if to say something before refraining and simply following Hanzo’s directives. He gingerly picked up Ahmya, ignoring Hanzo’s eyes that stayed on him the whole while. The little girl made a small noise, lifting her little hand to touch Cole’s cheek to which the cowboy responded with a smile like the stars. In moments like these, watching his ex-husband be a father, the yearning Hanzo felt threatened to take him over. Threatened to make him fall to his knees then and there and beg for a new start, to go back before they lost their home and themselves.
But he couldn’t.
The rest of the night was relatively. normal. Akiko was brought back by Genji (who was quickly ushered away as to not let him see Cole) as the cowboy helped Ahmya prepare for bed. Hanzo made tea, listening to the girls and the cowboy in the next room in an effort to not fall back into his own head. Sometimes moments alone were as much of a curse as they were a blessing.
When Cole left for the night, the only thing he was offered on the way out was a simple goodbye. Another brick in the wall between them.
Hanzo went to bed feeling like an open wound, staring at nothing in particular as he prepared to go to sleep. His mind stayed locked on the ring in his bedside table, and he almost didn’t realize when he grabbed it and sat on the bed with the delicate piece of jewelry in his hands. He clutched it so tightly it left marks in his palms, a particularly destructive part of his mind begging him to throw it into the ocean.
He knew he wouldn’t. Couldn’t.
It would be too much like letting go.
So he kept the ring, put it back into its new home, and curled up in bed with nothing beside him but the ghost of what could have been.