It was three days later that one of the largest funerals the people of Tokyo had ever seen happened. I would know, because I was the one who organized it. It may seem a little strange to you that I would do such a thing for the man I killed. But being second in command to the Okinawa section of the Yamakichi Gumi, such things fell directly under my jurisdiction, and I like to please.

See, the thing is, this funeral isn’t about the dead guy at all.

This whole event was about making an impression. About blocking the street with a funeral procession, about letting the press know it’s happening while pretending it’s confidential, and most of all, it was a huge pissing contest between our Oyabun and Eiji Shinoda. 

He was absent for the wake yesterday, and only I and the Oyabun had stayed the overnight vigil.  But it’s his brother that’s dead, so he would undoubtedly attend the funeral, and attend it as our guest. He would bring all his men, the defectors.

So we doubled the number of our own. You know, to make him feel small. Something I greatly relished.

I rested my elbows on the cold railing overlooking the vast courtyard. It was filled with around five hundred men dressed in their best suits. They didn’t look too sad about Masahiro’s death. The ones who would have been sad, had gone over to Eiji’s side. 

There’s something attractive about men in mourning, it adds a certain sincerity to their faces. Sometimes I wondered what they would think if they knew I was gay. Maybe they suspected it already. I don’t go to great lengths to hide it.

Did they think that about Masahiro? Probably not. Being interested in young boys was different.

The men were behaving, following my very specific instructions. 

The uniform way they bowed when each new guest paid their respects was a thing of beauty, like we were professionals and not the uncultured hooligans the media portrayed. The only thing that would make me happier was if I could trade their suits for kimono like the women’s attire. Most of my countrymen are suckers for people striving to protect their traditions from invading western influences. It would rally a lot of them to our side. 

The Oyabun’s car pulled up to the driveway and I made my way downstairs to greet her.

I bowed as she stepped out, looking absolutely stunning. The black of her Kimono stood stark against the brown of her wizened skin. Her glossy grey hair was pulled up elegantly and held in place by a silver brooch. She looked as stern as she always did, her eyes hard and cold as they looked at me briefly. She had given me permission, so I walked alongside her.

We stood among the other guests as they slowly walked up to where her husband’s coffin was placed, and through the small window that showed just his sewed up face, you wouldn’t even know what a mess I had made of his intestines. The coffin was filled with flowers, their bright colors offsetting the pallor of his skin.

A slight disturbance in the crowd told me that Eiiji had arrived. His men dressed identically in suits. We kept a respectful silence as he walked past us. I had never been looked at with such pure hatred.

I understood his sentiments. If someone had killed Suzuna, maintaining civility at a funeral organized by the one that had murdered her would be the furthest thing from my mind. But I was not in that position currently, and therefore, took great pleasure in the fact that he was.

The priest took him to the coffin, and he stood before it with hands clasped. He stayed that way for a while, then he lit some incense at the altar set up with photographs of Masahiro.

The Oyabun and I were the last to pay our respects. Incense tickled my nose as I went through the motions of bowing and praying. My hands trembled as I placed the flowers in the coffin, bile crawling up my throat.

The Oyabun’s face still betrayed nothing as she looked at the corpse of her husband. She held her palm just above his face, not touching him, but almost, her eyes were closed. Then she nodded. She was done.

The priest closed the viewing window, hiding his face away forever. 

The sight took me back to the first time I saw him.

It was shortly after my fourth birthday, a snowy time of year. I don’t remember what my birth parents did, and I didn’t make an effort to find out. But something brought them in direct contact with Masahiro, and they had pissed him the hell off.

I was asleep in my bedroom that night and my mother was yelling. It was a common occurrence, so I pulled the covers over my head and went back to sleep. Next thing I knew, I was woken by the loudest sound I had ever heard, followed by the wailing cry of my baby sister.

I fumbled my way across the darkened house to the edge of the staircase, and peeped through the gaps in the banister. Masahiro had looked at me then, looked me right in the eye as he shot my father in the leg.

I clenched my hand into a fist. Those eyes would never look at me again.