Gravitation Fan Fiction ❯ Black Cat ❯ Start Again ( Chapter 3 )

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Chapter Three: Start Again

 

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“Sakuma-sama's phone number?” If it were physically possible, I think Tatsuha would be tap-dancing on the ceiling about now. He grabs my wrist and proceeds to rub his cheek against the back of my hand. “Sakuma-sama….”

 

“Ugh. Stop doing that.” I don't understand how my teenage brother can be one of the most mature kids in Japan, but the minute that idiot's name is mentioned, he turns into a drooling fanboy. I yank my hand away. “All you have to do is help me find Shuichi.”

 

“You must really like this guy, aniki. I've never seen you go to such lengths for anyone.”

 

“Shut up.”

 

Tatsuha leans back against the couch with his hands behind his head. “A musician, huh? He must be way hot to get your attention.”

 

“Shut. Up.”

 

“Well, I'll help you,” he says, “On one condition. You gotta stop drinking until you're off those painkillers. I'm not going to be a party to you ending up in the hospital again. Mika, Tohma, and Dad will all kill me, and that's just three times as much dying as I am planning on doing in one lifetime.”

 

So, that's it, is it? I have to give up beer until we find Shuichi? Damn. Is that even worth it? It seems like an awfully big price to pay just to find someone who generally attempts to make my life miserable.

 

Somehow, however, I know that I've already made up my mind to find him.

 

I mean, he's such an incredible idiot. Without me in his life, he's like a lost little puppy, waiting to be stepped on by any thoughtless passerby. Right? This has nothing to do with me missing him, or any stupid thing like that. I just don't want to have to endure the karmic debt for him shitting up his own life because I wasn't there to stop him from being a moron.

 

I roll my eyes and grunt some sort of agreement to Tatsuha's demands.

 

Tatsuha smirks a little, smug in his minor victory. “Okay, well, what do we do first?”

 

I pick up the remote control and click off the television.

 

“First we order a copy of the `Hot Girls of Hokkaido'.”

 

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I consent to let Tatsuha push me around in the wheelchair. It's just quicker. With every passing moment, with every step, I feel the energy I stored up during my week in the hospital disappearing. And now that I've stopped drinking, I'm certain that the previously magnified effects of the painkillers will disappear.

 

Tatsuha wheels me into my office. I flick my hand towards my computer. “You're going to have to look it up on the internet. Usually, you can buy a copy of those shows on DVD for some outrageous sum.”

 

If anything, my brother takes direction well. When he wants to, he takes direction well. He turns on the monitor and moves the mouse around. “Let's see. Web browser, web browser, web browser…”

 

I look at the ceiling. It's a bit disturbing to watch someone else mess around on my computer. Even Shuichi knows that it's the worst kind of privacy invasion.

 

“Aniki! Aniki, there's something here!” Tatsuha jumps up and then runs over to wheel me closer to the desk. He points at an icon near the bottom of the screen. It's labeled `Shuichi.doc'.

 

Now, this is an unexpected turn of events. Did I leave myself some sort of note? Some explanation in case of emergency? No, that would mean that somehow I knew that I was going to get into that accident, which requires a disturbing amount of psychic foresight on my part, or severe suicidal tendencies.

 

And it also means something else. Unless this document details only the care and feeding of a certain black cat, it means that I knew who Shuichi was before I was in that accident.

 

“Open it.”

 

One double-click later, Tatsuha and I are staring at the following haiku:

 

“He sits in the rain,

Alone at the backlit bus stop…

Dappled red. He's blue.”

 

I see Tatsuha's jaw literally drop. “Shit, Eiri, I didn't know you were a poet, too. That haiku is just… Just so… Awful.”

 

“Shut up. It's obviously a first draft.” Is that all there is? There has to be more. “Try scrolling down.”

 

Tatsuha nudges the track-wheel on the mouse, but the document stays put. There is nothing else to see.

 

Crap. That's all? That can't be everything. “Tatsuha, bring up the system search utility. We'll scour the entire computer for any additional mentions of Shuichi.”

 

Why do I feel like I am in a really lame science fiction show, all of a sudden?

 

While we wait for the search process to grind through every document and folder on my computer, Tatsuha lights a cigarette for himself, and one for me. I don't know why. It's not like I'm so injured I can't even light my own cigarette. Nonetheless, I let it pass.

 

“Aniki, maybe this Shuichi was a character. You know, for one of your novels? You could have been thinking about it so hard that when you went into a coma…bang…it got rearranged in your head. The fictional character now seems real.”

 

“Impossible.” Besides, I saw him. Shuichi was on that show. Just for a second, sure, but I am absolutely certain it was him.

 

I'm fairly certain.

 

Alright, maybe I wish Tatsuha had been looking at the television so I could confirm that I really did see Shuichi.

 

The search box flashes on the screen. Tatsuha and I both lean in to get a better look.

 

No additional records containing the word “Shuichi”.

 

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Tatsuha and I decide to call it a night. I hate to admit it, but I'm worn out, and in more than a small amount of pain. Getting undressed and getting into bed proves to be a major task in itself, but I refuse to call my brother to help me. He's there, though, outside my door, asking if I need anything. I tell him to piss off.

 

Somehow, while I am trying to get comfortable, that cat slips into my room and jumps onto my bed. It tries to nestle in next to me. Fuck. The last thing that I want is cat hair all over my expensive sheets. I push it off my bed, but within a few minutes, it's right back where it was.

 

Just like Shuichi. Always wanting to sleep next to me. How obnoxious.

 

But, I'm just too tired to deal with the damn thing, and so let it stay.

 

Just for tonight.

 

My sleep is almost dreamless. I wake up with a single phrase echoing in my head.

 

“Alone at the backlit bus stop…dappled red.”

 

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“I need coffee.” Tatsuha yawns again, but I think he's forcing himself, this time. He's trying to drive home the point that he doesn't appreciate being dragged out of bed, or in this case, off of my couch, at five in the morning. “I'm a teenager. It's not healthy for us to get up before noon in the summer.”

 

I try to ignore his complaints, as mild as they are. The sun hasn't even risen above the horizon, and already I could use a cold drink. Preferably, a beer.

 

The morning's gray casts a hazy pall over the landscape of suburban Tokyo. It's yet too early, even for joggers or shopkeepers, so the only people on the streets tend to be those who have stayed out all night. Drunks straggling home. Rebellious teenagers sneaking back to their rooms. The unfaithful finally discovering the first twinges of guilt as they pull into their driveways.

 

The well-trimmed lawns, the benches, and even the trash-bins, are covered in the thin sheen of dew collected during the night. Nothing moves more than it must, as if for fear it might destroy the silence. Dawn on a weekend is the most surreal time in the world. Empty, quiet, and utterly devoid of connection to the reality that must certainly play out on these very streets at any other time. I can only assume that this is how Tokyo would look like at the end of a very strange apocalypse.

 

“Why are we here again?”

 

Tatsuha and I are underneath an exceptionally large momiji tree at the edge of a local park. It's the same park where Shuichi and I met. Or, where I thought we met. Tatsuha occasionally plucks another leaf off the tree, and proceeds to render it into miniscule pieces with his fingernails. For a monk, he's not very compassionate towards the local flora.

 

I nod my head at our target. Across the street, there's a bus stop in front of a row of stores. A mostly glass and metal affair, it's little more than an overhang with a back and two abbreviated sides, barely enough to protect anyone from the lightest of rains. Transportation posters, advertisements, and flyers for local businesses cover most of the open areas on the walls. It's just like hundreds of other bus stops in Japan, and probably around the world.

 

“You can't be serious. What are we supposed to do? Stake out every bus stop in Tokyo day by day, until we find the one this Shuichi might be using? What happened to our plan of getting a Sapporo phonebook and trying to…?”

 

I look at my watch. Or, rather, I try to look at my watch, and then I realize that I'm just looking at my cast. It's going to take a while to remember that I'm wearing my watch on the other arm these days.

 

This bus stop has to be the right one. I know it. There's only a limited amount of places that I travel regularly in Tokyo. The liquor store, to my editor's office, and to see my therapist. Everything and everyone else comes to me.

 

So, being that there are only a limited number of places I go, there are only a few bus stops I would have passed regularly. From there, it's fairly simple to deduce which one I meant in the haiku. This particular bus stop sits only three blocks from my flat. I drive past it almost anytime I go anywhere. And I always look at it. Well, not at it, but at the window of the bookstore behind the bus stop. Maybe it's a little conceited, but I'm constantly checking bookstores to make sure that my novels are prominently displayed.

 

“Aniki? You alright?”

 

I think I lost track of whatever Tatsuha was jabbering about. I glance at my watch again. Six o'clock. On the dot. Allowing myself a small smirk of triumph, I look across the street.

 

The lights in the bookstore behind the bus stop turn on. First the inside lights, and then the neon displays which circle the windows. Red neon. In the morning haze, the red light passes through the advertisements taped to the back of the bus stop, and casts the whole structure in a soft red glow.

 

“Backlit bus stop. Dappled red,” Tatsuha says as he shakes his head in disbelief. “Do you really think this is the one?”

 

“Maybe.” It might be. But, even if it is, there's no guarantee that it will help me find Shuichi. Sitting here, across the street, waiting for my possibly imaginary lover to take a bus to anywhere… I can't decide which is more pathetic, how desperate this seems, or the fact that I might very well be insane.

 

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By noon, the roots of the momiji tree are littered with cigarette butts and Styrofoam cups. I'm sweating, and this cast itches so much that I've actually considered telling Tatsuha to go buy me a butcher knife so I can perform a makeshift amputation. Hm. `Amputation in the Park' would be a good name for a novel. But, not a romance novel. I'd probably have to switch to horror for that one.

 

Noon. And no sign of Shuichi. We have been harassed by several people, though. The old woman who runs the bookstore came over and asked if we were alright. Little neighborhoods like this are full of nosy old biddies that butt into everyone's business. Tatsuha, clever asshole that he can be, told her that I had lost my wife in a car accident at that spot, and that we came every year to reflect and pray before visiting her grave. Such a sappy story. I can't believe she bought it. And I really can't believe that she didn't recognize me. My latest novel is on display in the window of her store. Idiot.

 

Well, at least Tatsuha's sob story convinced her to bring us free coffee for the rest of the morning.

 

“We should go back,” I finally say. This is pointless. What am I going to do, hang out here everyday, all day, until Shuichi decides to use this particular bus stop? And, it's even possible that I just made up that haiku. Maybe I was imagining some sort of scenario wherein Shuichi…

 

No. I wouldn't imagine crap like that.

 

Tatsuha flicks his cigarette into the street, and then takes hold of the handles of the wheelchair. Really, being pushed around in a wheelchair… How humiliating. Shuichi had better fucking appreciate what I've gone through just to find his stupid ass.

 

“I know. We could put up a really outrageous flyer at the bus stop. Something like `Desperately Seeking Shuichi'…”

 

“I'm not desperate.” But, it does feel a little desperate, acting like this. I watch the sidewalk pass as Tatsuha rolls me toward my flat. If my therapist were here, she'd definitely ask me something like, “How do you feel about it, Eiri-san?” Frankly, I don't want to feel any way at all about it. I just don't like this limbo. It's uncomfortable. I mean, if something else from inside my house disappeared suddenly, like my fridge or my couch, that would be unsettling, wouldn't it? Shuichi going missing from my life is no different than a piece of furniture disappearing. I'd want it back. I'd want to know how it got out of my house. What's wrong with that? Just because I want something back doesn't mean I'm completely attached to it. Right?

 

A rumbling noise shakes me from my thoughts. It's just a motorcycle coming down the street from behind us. Nonetheless, some instinct, some odd intuition, causes me to turn my head to look for the source.

 

And that's when I see a very familiar vehicle roaring up the road in our direction.

 

Nakano's motorcycle!

 

The rider is wearing a helmet. Yet, the hair streaming out the back can belong to no other asshole but Shuichi's guitarist. I'm pretty sure. Alright, I'm taking a fucking guess.

 

I turn back around and watch it head up the road.

 

Shit!

 

“Tatsuha! Follow that motorcycle!”

 

“You have to be shitting me.”

 

“Do it!”

 

“For fuck's sake… You better not be lying about Sakuma-sama's phone number.”

 

We start flying along the sidewalk. I can hear Tatsuha's rapid footfalls as he attempts to steer us past lampposts and garbage bins. My entire body rattles and shakes along with the wheelchair, which does absolutely nothing for the pain in my face and across my chest. On an upnote, I think all this agitation has caused my arm to stop itching.

 

I see Nakano's bike turn left at the next stoplight. Shit. “Fuck! Go faster!”

 

“I'm trying!”

 

“Left! Turn left!”

 

“Crap! Uck..”

 

I hear an odd clunking sound after we turn left, but think nothing of it. This road lays on an incline, so going downhill should help us in our chase. We pick up momentum with every inch forward, and are now hurtling down the middle of the street, which thankfully, appears to be momentarily empty.

 

Unfortunately, I've completely lost track of Nakano. Fuck! This is no good!

 

“Slow down, Tatsuha. I lost him.”

 

There's no response, and definitely no decrease of speed.

 

“Tatsuha, slow down!”

 

The wind rushes past my face. In a single and horrifying instant, everything becomes locked, frozen, and motionless. I realize that I can no longer hear Tatsuha's footfalls.

 

I am alone on this ride.

 

Now, here is the problem. I have one good hand. I can stop one wheel, but not the other. And, as I already discovered in the foyer of my flat, physics is not on my side. Especially with inertia and gravity added to the equation.

 

No time to think about that. What I really have to think about is getting out of this wheelchair. Yes. Considering how fast I'm careening towards that stopped bus, I really need to jump.

 

This isn't going to be pretty. I wonder if I'll break my arm in another place. Maybe I'll break the other one. Great.

 

I take a deep breath, brace myself for more pain than usual, and plant my feet on the ground. Well, alright, I suppose that wasn't a jump so much as an attempt to stand up. Unfortunately, this doesn't exactly stop the forward motion of the chair. I feel the wind knocked out of me, and my face slams into the pavement.

 

For a few moments, I hear only the sound of a wheel spinning, but it must be slightly broken, because the sound goes, “Shrrrchkchkshrrrrchkchk.”

 

Pain floods my senses. My shoulder, mostly, and my cheek. Just what I needed. Another week in the hospital.

 

“Yuki?”

 

I must be in a coma again. I hear Shuichi's voice. Maybe he does only exist in my imagination.

 

“Ohmygod! Yuki!” Something grips my shoulder and pushes me. I hear a shout of pain, but I'm hazy as to whether or not I am the one making it. Whatever is gripping me succeeds in turning me over.

 

And, there he is. Looking absolutely concerned, and more than slightly astonished.

 

Shuichi.

 

And that's when it all comes rushing back to me.

 

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Nighttime is writing time. I pop open a beer and shake out my hands. The climax, you see, requires a special mindset. I'm not just writing a novel anymore, I'm composing a symphony of words. I'm conducting a very precise experiment in the laboratory of the human psyche. I'm creating religion.

 

Buh-thucka-buh-thucka-buh-thucka.

 

I'm going insane.

 

Every night, for the past three nights, my inner sanctum has been invaded by the most repulsive of distractions. Noise. Not just any noise. Rampaging, irritating, ceaseless noise. Suddenly, my previously calm and secluded flat becomes a cacophonous battleground.

 

I can't take anymore. I'm fed up. Enough is enough. I shove myself away from the desk, and storm out the door and into the hallway. I'm on a deadline here. I can't believe these morons are breaking the building rules so blatantly. No loud music after ten o'clock at night!

 

I take the elevator down to the floor below mine, and sneer into the dimly lit hallway. I'll just scare them a little, just enough to keep them from pulling this shit again. I won't hurt them. No, just a little scare.

 

But, in the hallway, I see two kids. My neighbors. One of them is a scrawny slip of a teen, with pink hair and barely enough hips to hold up his pants. The other is a taller, more together looking kid with long reddish-brown hair. Shindou and Nakano. They're in some sort of band together or something. I've vaguely remember seeing flyers on the mailboxes and the lamp poles in front of our building. I don't know. I don't pay much attention to that crap.

 

Shindou is pounding on the door, yelling angrily as he thrashes about in the hallway. “Aizawa! Open the fucking door, you prick!”

 

“It's no use,” Nakano says. He shakes his head and proceeds to lean lazily against the wall opposite the door. “When he gets like this, there's nothing for it. You know that, Shuichi.”

 

“What are we supposed to do? Sleep out here in the hallway? I can't believe he locked us out. We should have never become roommates with him, Hiro. He's a complete ass.” Shindou presses his face to the door and adds, “AND HIS MUSIC SUCKS! You hear me in there, Aizawa?”

 

“Yeah, but what can we do? He pays eighty percent of the rent.”

 

Shindou slumps forward a bit and takes a deep breath. “Yeah.” At that point, apparently, he finally notices me standing by the elevator, because he immediately pushes himself away from the door and proceeds to bow. “Ah, um, Yuki-san. I'm so sorry about the loud music. Aizawa locked us out again.”

 

I just watch them for a while. Shindou keeps bowing and apologizing, and Nakano is trying not to look at me. He's obviously embarrassed. Hn. Musicians. Noisy. Rambunctious. Most of them have absolutely no songwriting talent whatsoever.

 

I'm not going to get involved. Definitely not. “Yeah, whatever. Just don't let it happen again after tonight.”

 

“Um, well…” Shindou sort of scuttles up to me, a nervous smile spicing his oddly alluring lips. “Um, if there's any way I could…um…make it up to you, Yuki-san…”

 

God. I think this kid is hitting on me. I'm going to have to try really hard not to laugh in his face.

 

“Make it up to me?”

 

“Yeah, I mean…” There go the eyelashes, fluttering ever so lightly, almost without any artifice at all. He's bad at this. Really bad. “Would you like to come to one of our shows? We play at a local place! I could put you on the guest list…”

 

I snort derisively. “Why would I want to do that?”

 

Shindou shakes his head, and those devilishly pink locks tumble to-and-fro. “Thought we could…I don't know…hang out….afterwards. Or-something-like-that.”

 

I just roll my eyes and turn on my heel. “Not interested.” I step back into the elevator and watch as Shindou slinks back to where Nakano is standing. Before the doors are securely closed, I think I hear him say something along the lines of, “Wow, I really blew it, huh?” But, I can't be sure, due to the fact that their roommate's music is now practically causing the whole building to vibrate.

 

I go back to my flat, and plop down into my desk chair.

 

But, there is nothing to write. Nothing comes out. I tell myself that it's because of the music.

 

But, really…

 

I just can't get Shindou out of my head.

 

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Three weeks later, and I'm still thinking about that idiot. I don't know why. I don't know why. Something nags me about him. It eats at me. It makes food bland, and cigarettes unappealing. I'm disturbed by recurring visions of our meeting in the hallway. In these visions, I say different things, act contrary to my nature, and play out strange scenarios. There's even one scenario where I climb out onto the window ledge, break into Shindou's flat, and beat up this Aizawa guy.

 

I see Shindou, occasionally. And, I can't decide if I'm looking for him, or if it is just coincidence. Is it both? I don't know. All I know is that every time I do see him, I feel dizzy and disoriented, as if someone forced me to run through a carnival funhouse. And, I hate carnivals. I mean, I really hate carnivals. Tohma took me to one when I lived in New York. Scared the shit out of me. Family entertainment, my ass.

 

Shindou seems to be everywhere. I see him getting his mail. He waves at me, and says a chipper, “Hi Yuki!” He's in the elevator, telling me about how his band got a great new gig. He's getting off of Nakano's motorcycle and heading inside. He's at the bus stop. More and more, everywhere I look, there's Shuichi.

 

Then, one day, I hear a knock on my door. I decline to answer it. But, the knocking won't stop. Finally, I go to see who is trying to disturb my creative process.

 

It's Shuichi.

 

“Um, I'm so sorry to bother you, Yuki-san.” There's some sort of oddly shaped box next to his feet. “I have this, um…really big favor to ask you…”

 

“What?”

 

“Well, you see… My grandma is real sick, and my mother is having a hard time taking care of her and holding down a job at the same time. So, um, I'm gonna go to Sapporo to help her out for a while… At least until my sister finishes her term.”

 

How familial. How…strangely responsible.

 

I can actually feel my patented `get lost' glare losing power. “Yeah? What's that got to do with me?”

 

“Well, see… Hiro is kinda working at a resort in Yokohama, and he won't be here much… And I just can't trust Aizawa, so… I was wondering if you'd look after my cat until I got back? I'd totally take him with me, but my grandma is allergic. I wouldn't ask, `cause I know that's probably not your thing. But, it's just a real emergency, I swear!”

 

I'm about to tell him to get lost. About to slam the door in his face. But, instead, I just look down at the box, the cat-carrier, I realize now, and ask, “What's its name?”

 

“Shu-chan! He's really sweet. You'll like him!”

 

“You named the cat after yourself?”

 

“Well, yeah. What's wrong with that?”

 

And that's how I acquired a cat.

 

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

 

Several weeks later, Shuichi mailed me tickets to one of his shows. Apparently, he was coming back from Sapporo for a weekend to do a gig that they'd set up before he'd left. He said that the tickets were a thank-you for taking care of that stupid cat. I'd really have preferred beer, but I decided to go. Yes, I was going to go just to confirm what an untalented punk he was. I would go and satisfy my curiosity, and then my strange fixation would definitely come to an end. That's the only reason I would go to a `Bad Luck' show.

 

But, even though I left my apartment, my destination turned out not to be a live music show, but the hospital.

 

Tatsuha was right.

 

I hit my head pretty good.

 

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

 

“Yuki? Yuki, are you okay? What's with this cast? And all these bandages on your face? Is that a wheelchair?” Shuichi asks the questions rapid-fire. He doesn't even give me a chance to answer.

 

Seconds later, Tatsuha appears. “Shit, aniki. Sorry about that. I fell down at the top of the hill, and…” Tatsuha's eyes go wide and he points at Shuichi. “Jumping Buddha on a Pogo Stick! Is this the guy?”

 

“Shut up, Tatsuha.” Great. Now all I need is for Tatsuha to tell Shuichi that I was looking for him.

 

This is so bizarre. Shuichi is here, but he's not Shuichi. At least, most of what I know about Shuichi isn't real. I barely know him. He's just a neighbor who hit on me a few times, and whose cat I'm looking after while he tends to a sick relative.

 

There's this strange feeling of loss in the pit of my stomach, but I know it is completely irrational. Because how can you lose something you never had? All those things we went through together, Shuichi and I, they were just a coma-induced dream. And yet, there really is a Shuichi. A real person who I know, but whom I rejected.

 

“He's bleeding. Oi! Someone call a doctor. Or an ambulance!”

 

Is this the real Shuichi? Or was the real Shuichi the one I knew before? Am I in a coma now, maybe still dreaming, still asleep, still creating my own universe? How can I know? How can I ever tell, really, where my imagination stops and the truth begins?

Which part of life is a lie, which parts of our lies are life?

 

Why is it always Shuichi? Like a curled fist, like a singer clutching a microphone, like a writer clutching a pen, some things we just keep holding onto, no matter how many realities we traverse. Somehow, I just can't let go of him, despite how much I tell myself he doesn't matter to me at all.

 

Maybe the only thing I can ever do...

 

Is hope that wherever we end up…

 

He'll always remember me, too.

 

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Epilogue: Three Weeks Later

 

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“Yuki! Yuki! Are you awake?” The door opens slightly, and Shuichi's head pops into my bedroom. “There you are. How are you feeling?”

 

“Like shit.” I put down the book I'm reading. I don't usually indulge in the competition's worthless tripe, but I might as well, since it's still a few weeks until my cast comes off. Actually, I'm not in as much pain these days. I guess I'm healing up fairly well.

 

…No thanks to my brother or this worthless idiot. Shuichi comes to bother me every single day. I swear he never misses a chance to annoy me.

 

The wheelchair accident turned out to not be all that bad. I had a pretty big gash on my temple, and a cut on my shoulder. I had to get a few stitches, but no additional bones were broken.

 

“I brought your mail.” Shuichi smiles as he waves the pile of mail at me. I shrug, and motion to the chair beside my bed. I let him keep the chair there, so that he's not constantly dragging it in here from the kitchen. It'll be just my luck that he scrapes up my nice hardwood floors. He plops down onto the chair, lets his backpack fall onto the floor haphazardly, and starts going through my mail. “Electricity bill, water bill, phone bill…”

 

Oh right. Phone bill. I make a mental note to get Shuichi a cellphone. Not because I want to call him or anything… It just turns out that their phone is in Aizawa's name. That's why I never could get a hold of Nakano.

 

“Hey Yuki, this one is a package.” Shuichi shakes it a little bit. “What did you get me?”

 

“You? Why would I get you anything?” Mental note to self… Order phone for Shuichi anonymously.

 

“Because you think I'm sweet.” Shuichi gives me this knowing smile, and just for a moment, I think he gets it. He knows who we are, and that we always are…just like this…together. He knows more about me, and how I feel about him, than I will ever know, myself. Maybe he's not as much of an idiot as I'm always saying. “Can I open it, Yuki? Hmmm? I love surprises!”

 

“Yeah, whatever.”

 

Shuichi immediately rips into the package. I'm more than slightly surprised when he pulls out a plastic rectangle. Huh? A DVD case?

 

“The Hot Girls of Hokkaido?” Oh, good lord. He's already looking at me as if I betrayed him with a DVD purchase. We haven't even gone out yet! We haven't even kissed yet!

 

Though, possibly kissing Shuichi is one of the reasons I'm looking forward to getting out of this cast. Actually, I have to admit, there's quite a few reasons becoming more mobile is high on my list of priorities. And, yeah, maybe I did promise Shuichi I'd go on a date with him. I was bleeding at the time, and in an ambulance. In situations like that, shit just happens. I can't be blamed.

 

Nonetheless, I roll my eyes and say, “Quit looking at me like that. That DVD is Tatsuha's.”

 

“But, it's addressed to you!”

 

Thankfully, at that moment, my brother barges into my room, without warning and certainly without knocking. “Aniki!!! I swear, if I wasn't a monk, I'd kill you!”

 

“What the fuck is your problem?”

 

Tatsuha is waving around a slip of paper like it's made of molten lava.

 

“This phone number you gave me!”

 

Oh, it's that slip of paper. “So?”

 

Tatsuha wads the paper up and lobs it at my face. “This number is for a pizza parlor in San Diego.”

 

I unfold the paper and stare at the writing. It's still exactly as I transcribed it from my conversation with Tohma.

 

Hm. Well, what do you know?

 

Those must have been some kickass painkillers.

 

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

 

The End.

 

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

 

Thanks for reading Black Cat! I hope you enjoyed this fun little tale as much as I enjoyed writing it. Special super-duper thanks to all the reviewers, and all the kids down at gurabite. You rock, and I hope that…in what ever reality you visit…you're able to find that special someone.