What is your most romantic experience, either with your current partner or your ex?
Ahhhhh shit. They’re all so different so I’m just going to go with three most, ah, thingie experiences.
Penny - the first day we moved in together. She knew I wasn’t leaving my home in the best of circumstances so she was waiting at that shitty little walk-up apartment over the convenience store, and she made boxed mac n cheese and Spam and ho-hos for dessert and she was wearing her cute little Sailor Moon costume from Halloween and she was like ‘welcome home dear’ and I took one look at her trying to make a home for us and I think I ugly-cried. It wasn’t the reaction she was expecting, haha. We smoked so much pot that night, the neighbours got high.
My wife - this is so cheesy but for some reason it worked with her. Maybe because she was so young, and I got swept up in all that youthful romantic stuff, but. We were all in that afterglow moment under the covers in my bed. Our bed, sorry. And we were like ‘let’s marry each other right now’ and so we just lay there and spoke wedding vows to each other. God, I shake my head thinking about it now, but man. She really made it feel good, you know? Made me feel hope, like anything was possible if you just loved someone enough and all that fucking bullshit.
Tuah - it’s hard to say, it’s all so recent so it all seems like a romantic sad dream. I know this sounds weird but it’s the day he decided to give me all his old journals. The ones I knew he kept, all handwritten over decades, over fucking centuries, about his life and experiences and all the precious things that Tuah recorded, because it’s so easy to forget one’s long long life, as a vampire. But one day he was like ‘I trust you enough to let you read these’ and god the look in his eyes. He was terrified, but he powered through it, because he wanted to put his faith in me. And yeah, look what what I did in the end. @xxtuaharjunaxx
I miss you and I miss Tuann so if you're still doing the thing... our boys + Forever a Soldier? xoxo
Forever a Soldier by Genevieve Turner
When Hank returns from combat, he agrees to move into a 100-year-old house owned by his great-great aunt and uncle. His peace is disturbed by Lale, an inquisitive scholar digging into his family’s secrets. But their attraction will open up hidden places in their hearts…
@xxtuaharjunaxx
Perhaps it wasn’t ‘old’ for some of the more whiter Americans; but to Tuah, this house meant family pride. Fought and scraped and battled for when his great-great Aunt and Uncle faced hostile obstacles like the Chinese Exclusion Act and the ‘Yellow Peril’ scare.
They weren’t even Chinese. But that didn’t matter, not when the US treated everyone from the ‘Orient’ the same: poorly, and unfairly.
Major Tuah Arjuna from the 1st Marines, however, had promised himself. If he’d made it back from Guadacanal, he’d return to this old Victorian bequeathed to him in his great great Aunt’s will. He’d settle in San Francisco, slowly restore the home to its former glory, and live a quiet, peaceful life until his end.
Granted, he didn’t count on Captain Cardero showing up on his doorstep, one cool, foggy morning.
“It’s not that I don’t have anywhere else to go,” Iann said, stepping into Tuah’s home. He took a quick, inquisitive glance around and Tuah sighed, knowing he couldn’t stop the Intel officer from gathering, well, intel. Even in peacetime.
“I was in the neighbourhood and you always made your little corner of the earth sound so idealistic.” Iann grinned at Tuah. “I hadda see it with my own eyes, didn’t I. Brrr. You got anything to take the edge off? Bloody cold on the West Coast.”
“You’re too used to the heat and humidity, I think,” Tuah replied evenly, showing Iann into his kitchen, where he procured a bottle of brandy (for medicinal purposes) and poured Iann a glass. Iann pinched his fingers an inch apart, and Tuah sighed again and poured a bit more before handing it to the other soldier. “I thought you said you’d stick around South East Asia? See the better parts of the world, yes?” The parts not ravaged by the war; Tuah believed Iann would be hard-pressed to find that.
“That’s the stuff,” Iann said after his first drink. “I did. While you were attending parades and getting tin toys pinned to your chest on the home-front, I was…back there. Seeing better parts of the world.” Iann took another sip. “Seeing where you came from.”
Tuah stiffened then. He’d been something of a mystery to his men - he fought hard to gain their respect, which Tuah didn’t mind. How could he expect men to fight for him, if they didn’t respect him. There was plenty of speculation about his heritage - that he was part Native Indian, that he was a bastard of the East India British rule, that he was a defect from the Japanese. All of it wrong, because none of them could understand the cultural nuances of the countries these Americans occupied for more than 3 years.
The only person he’d ever shared a hint of his background, happened to be Iann Cardero. Late one night, huddled in a bungalow, dehydrated and feverish from a gun shot wound and infection. He’d hoped Cardero would’ve forgotten by now…but apparently not.
“Something to take back to your university? Now that you’re home, I suppose you’ll return to teaching about old relics and ancient times,” Tuah said evenly, putting the kettle on.
Iann shook his head. “No sir, I’m done with that. After seeing what we’ve seen…facing bright-eyed bushy-tailed co-eds sort of loses its thrill.” He sat, uninvited. “I’d rather learn more about humanity, and loss. I got a research grant from the university, I can make do for a good year. And I figured I’d start with you.”
“But what about –”
“She left me, Tuah,” Iann cut him off and then stood up again, heading to look out the window. “I can’t even say I blame her.”
“I’m sorry,” Tuah said respectfully; but he’d lost too many people, seen too many good men and innocent civilians die, to feel much pity about a wife who simply decided not to be a wife anymore.
“You had a wife once,” Iann said, and once more Tuah tensed up, shocked at Iann’s announcement. Because it was true…but how did Iann know? Iann turned to look at Tuah. “Not here though. You were born in the States, but you…didn’t grow up here, did you.”
So much for a quiet and peaceful life. “If you’re done your toddy, Cardero, you’re free to head on your way. I wasn’t expecting visitors.”
“No, but all your talk about this place,” Iann looked around again, smiling as he pat a wood beam. “It certainly lives up to the fantasy you spun me, Tuah. One day I hope I can discover the whole reality.”
“Good-bye, Captain.”
—-
Only it wasn’t goodbye. Iann somehow managed to situate himself in San Francisco, and therefore showed up constantly at Tuah’s home. Tuah tried to be polite at first, but eventually the frequency of Iann’s visits and his lack of guest propriety made Tuah give up on etiquette himself. He just worked, while Iann wandered.
And asked questions. All of those incessant questions about his past - his parents, his grand parents, his wife, his everything. Some Tuah answered, others Tuah ignored the man. Sometimes he tried to turn the tables on Iann and ask him pushy questions. But the man wasn’t an Intelligence Officer, trained to keep secrets even under torture for nothing - somehow Iann managed to either answer blithely, or deflect subtly.
But Tuah also didn’t have many friends. And eventually it got to a point where the days that Iann didn’t show up, Tuah found himself missing the company and conversation immediately. it was ridiculous; in the Pacific, he’d been constantly surrounded by men and conversation, noise and fighting and violence all the time. Tuah took it in stride, but he’d grown to hate it. He only wanted peace - now that he had it, Tuah found himself missing that busy atmosphere. Iann Cardero somehow managed to make the place seem as busy as if twenty other people were in the room.
Eventually Tuah kept Iann over for lunch, then dinners. He shared some scant, tiny photos of his family - his siblings, most of whom were now either dead or lost between the US and Malaysia.
And one night, Iann ended up staying so late, drinking so much of Tuah’s brandy, that he fell asleep on Tuah’s couch.
Tuah didn’t mind, and didn’t want to disturb him. So he placed a blanket over Iann and was about to head to bed when –
– suddenly Iann was on him, grabbing at his collar, pushing a switchblade knife to Tuah’s throat.
“I’ll kill you! I’ll - KILL –”
“Iann, Iann, wake up. Iann Cardero,” Tuah gasped, holding Iann at bay (Tuah was stronger) but still horrified by the outburst. Nightmares - he should’ve known. He wasn’t surprised. Iann had been captured, a POW for five long months. One of Tuah’s companies had freed him, along with the others captured from the HQ. The things they’d faced…
Tuah took a hold of Iann’s wrists and pressed him back, carefully, until Iann was backed against a wall. “Iann Cardero.”
Iann blinked, the fog clearing from his eyes as he finally focused on Tuah, in the dim late night light. “Tuah…Arjuna.”
If asked later by some imaginary friend, Tuah would’ve said that it was the way Iann said his name, that made Tuah kiss the other man. There was some quality to it that overcame Tuah - revealed a side of himself that was lonely, craving intimacy, hoping to be loved and valued.
Even if it was in the form of a nosy professor-cum-Captain, who kept barging into his life, both in his present-day and past.
Maybe it was sad of him, that this was the only way Tuah felt any sort of love. From anyone recently, anyway. Since his wife had died, ten years ago.
So Tuah felt Iann sag against the wall and caught his lips in a fevered, deep kiss. He crushed himself against Iann, who eventually lifted his head up to gasp for breath, but Tuah wasn’t done there. He kissed down Iann’s jaw, buried his face against Iann’s craned neck.
“I knew it,” Iann breathed, his hips surging against Tuah’s. The only way to touch, because Tuah still had his wrists pinned to the wall. The switchblade fell to the floor in a clatter. “I knew you were like this…like me.”
“Yes…” Tuah said, but he’d never realized it until right at this moment. Until Iann kissed him again, a heated, frenzied dance of tongue and teeth. Tuah wanted to be with a man; and this man wanted to be with him back. “Please.”
Only this was all so new to Tuah, he wasn’t even sure what he was asking for. But when he looked in Iann’s dark eyes, it seemed Iann did. And no words were needed when Iann asked to show Tuah how it was done. Tuah didn’t hesitate to consent.
Cardero was the Intelligence Officer, after all; and his intel was rarely ever wrong.
