Principle of Sufficient Reason
A/N: A tribute to New York City and its events from June – October/November 2011.
Sasuke keeps his breathing steady when he feels the comforter slide up his shoulder and the weight of the mattress shift from under him. The sound of padded footsteps is almost inaudible, and same goes for the door. Then there is nothing but the dim hum of the AC, and a ca-clank of a loose manhole from the street outside. The car lights have already passed when Sasuke opens his eyes.
This is the third time he knows how he got here, compared to the four or more times he didn't. Likewise, this is the second time he knows how he got here but did not leave the scene first.
This is the first time he did not want to leave.
So at five o'clock exactly, his brother excuses himself instead. Itachi moves quickly, fast enough to be prepared before Sasuke even contemplates getting up. And by the time Sasuke does roll out of bed, the kitchen is empty. A cup of hot coffee is left behind on the table, as are two plates sandwiched together.
Sasuke uncovers the top plate to find a variety of fruits, two slices of multi-grained bread, and an omelet with a side of sliced tomatoes.
A note besides the breakfast.
10 digits.
He covers the breakfast back up with more force than necessary, and does not touch it again.
...
The sun is glaring, the traffic dreadful. A ten minute delay at one intersection, and it has progressively gotten worse as time ticks towards rush hour.
Sasuke isn't concerned. He's never late.
He finishes skimming the proposal when a headline from the taxi television catches his eye.
"Lawmakers Friday have voted to legalize same-sex marriage, making New York the largest state..."
Flashes of images scan through the small screen. One captures a parade through the streets.
From the rearview mirror, the driver has twinkling eyes. Their gazes meet.
"Today's a good day," the driver comments.
Sasuke isn't interested in small talk. As the taxi pulls to the curb, he closes his laptop, swipes his card, and leaves with a slam of the door.
...
A hot blast of air – humid, sticky, the scent of smoke and cigarettes, kerosene and morning pretzels. Flocks of pigeons peck at the sidewalk. Sasuke maneuvers through the flow of pedestrians with ease, his foot back on the sidewalk just as the light turns red. He strides past chaos without so much as a brush against his blazer.
Across the street is the water rush of a black marble fountain. A skyscraper awaits past the ascent of stairwells. Twin glass doors open to marble floors and chrome bars, high ceilings, attractive men and women in black.
The elevator ride to the seventy-ninth floor, everyone is fiddling with expensive phones, musing over trivial matters and recent news.
"Hold it!"
Out of courtesy, Sasuke places out a foot, stops the closing doors to let the elevator accompany one more.
"Not like you to be late," comes a snicker.
The newcomer scowls, hair ruffled, deep rings etched under his eyes.
Someone tries to strike up conversation. "Everyone's held up by traffic today. Marriage certificates."
"No shit. I'm one of them."
Everyone breaks out of the insulation of their cell phones, and turns to the latecomer in disbelief.
"You're kidding."
"No," he deadpans. "My wife and I tried to get a license the day the office was at its busiest."
...
Sasuke turns the band on his finger.
He imagines himself slipping it into the cracks of a sewer. Maybe flicker it outside a window seventy nine stories high.
Or maybe just in the garbage bin of one of the bathrooms. After washing, he would wipe his hands. And with magician's grace, discard the paper towel and fifty thousand dollars worth of trash inside.
It was supposed to have been a titanium band ordered online during his lunch break anyway.
...
"The company is spiraling into a liquidity crisis, we're ass deep in trillions of debt, the press is eating us alive, the Fed is outside our door... and you're playing Solitaire."
Sasuke doesn't spare a blink. A card flips. Ten of diamonds.
A fist pounds on his desk. He smells her perfume.
"With people like you, it's no wonder this shit happened." Ino files out violently.
If it were any other day, Sasuke would have just fired her. Fired everyone in the building. He would have seized control of the situation, made the right phone calls, held up the crucial meetings, contacted key connections, and met with the CEO. He would have tried to save the sinking titantic, found the loans, calmed the media, trashed the models, and prevented an utter systemic bankruptcy.
He has the charisma and ability to sway and exploit people, the hyperintelligence beyond formulas and codes, to accomplish all that. He has done it before.
But that expands far past the necessity of his job description.
One would think with a salary of two million a year, he would be put to good use. But he's not. Their loss.
Two of spades.
...
Heads turn. It's Harlem. The not-so cleaned up parts, where apartments lay empty, garbage piles up, and taxis are scarce. Not a Starbucks or any bourgeois crap within vicinity. People don't catch a tailored Armani walking down the streets here.
Harlem has came far from its reputation of prostitutes, drug dealers, and people shot up on the block. But those things aren't completely history, nor is Harlem free from its stereotypical image as a predominately African American and Hispanic community, their incomes below the national average, standard of living not quite there. When the economy crashes, the residents here take it particularly hard.
Recovery will be difficult, but they'll survive.
Sasuke stops before a dilapidated basketball court, a wall mural of clefs and dance, botany and atoms. He passes the school and descends down to the subways.
There is a woman in her wedding dress on the express train, holding tightly to the hand of her wife.
...
In the suburbia of Somerset County, New Jersey, there is a house of thirty-nine thousand square feet, five bedrooms, a beautiful back garden. The neighborhood is wealthy, safe, only half a mile from both the middle and high school. It belonged to a married couple – a reputable anesthesiologist of Columbia and a CFO of Wall St – for six years, but remained empty for the past two. The last day it was occupied, the anesthesiologist silently packed her bags and walked out the front door.
No one bothered to stop her.
Now, the house is the market with all the other houses after the bubble crash.
To this day, Sasuke still does not know where his wife is.
...
She stares at him, the edges of her eyes slightly red. She forces an awkward smile, "Hey, Mr. Uchiha," then exits the apartment, backpack in tow.
She's a regular guest, one of four. Sasuke recognizes all of them by now. The walking attitude with the grey sweatshirt, beat-up Nike, and braids down his skull. The wholesome cross-dresser who smokes a pack a day, language as foul as her breath. The overweight skank in the tube top, living proof that whores comes in all sizes.
The one who just left is the oldest of the bunch. She also comes the most.
Sasuke knows she is an older sister of two, raised by a single mother sitting on a pile of credit card debt. Has an eating disorder, aborted once, and pops an Advil a day. She fell in love with three of her teachers and often fantasized about them. One lost its appeal. One became a nightmare reality. And the last one remained a dream, in which, for him, she scored 780 and 740 respectively on her Math and Physics SATs.
"She's moving next month to her relative's," Itachi explains, closing the door. "Her mother can't pay rent."
Sasuke eyes the three empty plates on the kitchen table, nothing but orange peels, sunflower seed shells, and a mountain of chicken bones.
Itachi picks up the plates and smiles. "She came to say good-bye. Starting next fall, she be will attending Stanford on a full scholarship."
...
Of all the wasted resources, Sasuke considers Itachi the worst.
Itachi is number one of his class in Harvard, offered one of the highest starting salaries before he even graduated. The following sixteen years, he traveled abroad to various universities in pursuit of the sciences, philosophy, and political research. The work he accomplished is phenomenal; graduate students of all fields have encountered his name at least once in their textbooks.
Then he disappeared off the face of the world.
He decided he wanted to teach.
Not as an university professor, but a high school teacher. A teacher of a beat-down non-charter middle and high school in the dead middle of Harlem, New York City.
Itachi works well over fourteen hours a day. Sasuke makes fifty times his salary with a decimal fraction of the effort.
Sasuke doesn't care that his brother is the most proficient teacher in existence. He doesn't care that the acceptance rates of the worst schools have spiked to phenomenal levels. He doesn't care that he himself would have been nothing without his brother's influence in his youth. Sasuke needs only the flash of a digital clock past two, light under the crack of the bedroom door, the sound of sub-par papers being meticulously graded to feel his blood boil.
In terms of comparative advantage, Itachi became the biggest waste of a human resource the minute he relinquished his potentiality for a third-rate job and crack-ridden students.
But maybe, just maybe, that's jealousy speaking.
...
"You should be sleeping, Sasuke," Itachi gently admonishes, hypocritical as always. His tie hangs loosely around his neck, his shirt is buttoned.
Sasuke says nothing when his brother changes in front of him and sets his hair loose for the night.
Sasuke continues to type on his laptop, files sprawled across the bed. A copy of the day's New York Times in plain sight, intentionally made to be seen.
Itachi doesn't take the bait, only fold the paper and place it back on Sasuke's side of the bed. That is when he catches sight of the paperwork.
"Resume?" Itachi keeps his tone calm. "Did you quit?"
"No."
From his peripheral, Sasuke begins to see concern across his brother's face.
Sasuke returns to his work, and only after a long pause, decides to grace Itachi with an answer. "I wasn't fired."
Itachi is smart enough to connect the rest. Relieved, he takes a seat on the bed. "I see. What are your plans, Sasuke?"
Maybe the government. Maybe Chicago or Silicon Valley. Maybe out of the States altogether. But only if he is serious in getting a job. He's not. All of this is nothing but busy-work, regulations, something to sedate his boredom while he waits for someone to finish grading those damn papers.
Once again, Itachi sees right through his act. As usual, he follows along. As usual, he turns the tables. "Why don't you take this opportunity to find Sakura."
The laptop slams close. The papers are shuffled away, the lamp turned off. Sasuke yanks the covers over himself and goes to sleep.
...
As Sasuke predicted, the company bankrupts the next day. Trillions of dollars worth of assets, gone. All those investments, bills, small little savings in hopes of a better house, for their children to go to a better college, worthless.
That night, everyone is drowning their misery, literally. People don't question why Sasuke joins them; the day is shitty enough for the most composed man to drink.
Sasuke knows he has a low alcohol tolerance. It's a good thing. He doesn't flush, but after five shots, his inhibitions are done with, his judgment mush, his memory wiped. If he vomits, he will not remember.
He doesn't dwell too much on the miracle that he makes it to the apartment alive. The flash of a digital four colon doesn't register either.
All he feels is a sense of elation when he opens the door, and sees his brother waiting for him at an empty table, the food already set away.
Itachi is visibly fatigued, but worry keeps him up. Not only does he know Sasuke's schedule far too well, but also understands Sasuke enough to know this would happen. He understands. He trusts Sasuke to be sensible and responsible. And yet, he never goes to sleep until Sasuke comes home.
Itachi does a quiet assessment of Sasuke's condition, then flips close his book and heads for the bedroom.
For all that caring, Itachi does an excellent job of stabbing a knife in him when he walks past without a word.
...
Sasuke is in no mood for any more charades. He hates the pretense. He feels silly dropping more and more hints Itachi selectively decides to not notice. But worse, he feels ridiculous he must voluntarily intoxicate himself to have sex with his older brother, who he knows is more than involuntary.
And Sasuke doesn't even give a crap about the sex.
What he really wants is a statement. A statement he has been trying and trying to say, but Itachi just refuses to listen.
Fine then. Actions speak louder.
Itachi forces apart the kiss. His eyes are harsh, strict, pained. He breaks free of Sasuke's grip and continues on to the bedroom. If the advances continue, then he will leave for a hotel for the night.
Sasuke wonders if that is what happened in one of his former attempts, when he woke up in an empty apartment in the dead of night with everything in shambles. Pictures tossed, gradebooks ripped, chairs flipped, plates broken. At first, he thought of where the apartment is located, with its iron barred windows, and was one dial button away from the police and his lawyer. Then he saw the locks still in place, felt the angry aftereffects of a hangover, and knew.
It was unfortunate he woke up before Itachi could return and clean everything up. Or else he wouldn't have ever known Itachi could feign ignorance as well as he could.
Now, he knows, and he still wants to try. And this time, he won't let Itachi get away. He won't let him slip into some lousy hotel, while he lashes his rage out at an abused apartment. He is going to bar that blasted bedroom door, and force off all his brother's clothes.
Sasuke wonders how bad rape would be if he will not remember doing it.
He seizes his slipping judgment, and forces himself out of the apartment instead.
...
It was the engagement process.
She was respectable, intelligent, appealing, and absolutely in love with him. There was an underlying friendship somewhere before that.
Logically, it made sense at the time to keep Sakura, and Sasuke would follow through with the marriage as he would with a college graduation.
Itachi flew in a month before the wedding, and gotten to know his would-be wife better than Sasuke did. In the end, Itachi was the one to pick out the wedding bands. He had gotten to understand Sakura's tastes, whereas Sasuke had not bothered to, found something much more ethereal and elegant than something bulky of higher dollar value.
He was also the one at the jeweler's that day and slipped on the band to Sasuke's finger, his eyes smiling.
At Sasuke's wedding, there were two people who were undeniably at their happiest in their lifetime.
One was his newly made wife.
And the other, his older brother.
...
Sasuke wakes up, dressed in a rumpled suit. A vast ceiling greets him, a modern ceiling fan. The single master bedroom is five times as spacious as Itachi's entire apartment. The house is still furnished like a renovated, designer house should be. But there is no warmth, no hint of habitation, not a single photo on the wall. It has the feel of an abandoned hotel.
There is no lock on the back door, the one that leads in from the garden. It is how he entered, and it is through the same door he exits.
The walk to the bus station is forty long minutes of peaceful solitude, and inner turmoil.
Sasuke contemplates his options, and decides it is best to disappear for now.
...
Risk. It's one of the first things they teach you in the finance industry. How to reduce it, spread it, intensify it a hundred-fold, because the line between business and gambling is none.
Systemic risk. It's what happens when you go down and bring everything down with you.
The meetings are stressful, the board in a fret, the government flooding in, the lawyers and lobbyists readying their armor. The banks, investors, politicians. Everything reaches a climax, and a resolution.
"We're bailed out."
Sasuke makes no comment, only scrolls through the lists of available hotels within the tri-state area. There is not much to say.
Other people have plenty of opinions. An indignant soul somewhere is marking his protest right now. Why should we pity a firm that swindles, cheats, shifts the money around in a way it can soak up the most profits. Why should we save a firm that gambled repeatedly with outrageous stakes that it's inevitable they lose. Why are they not taking responsibility. Why are we, the taxpayers, paying billions of dollars for their greed and their mistakes. We have mortgages to pay, kids to feed, the death choke of unemployment and debt to fend off. Who is bailing us out. Where is the justice.
Justice?
Justice is currently in the form of fifty of the state's most brilliant corporate lawyers eight to ten floors below. The lawyers are on their side. The government officials are on their side. The businessmen are on their side. All their paychecks depend on each other.
Sasuke meets with them later in the day to go through the proper paperwork, make sure the company suffers the least amount of damage, and the bailout packages are as scrumptious as possible. He has no comment, nor the slightest guilt, when he pulls strings and raise the limit to a grand total of two hundred billion dollars to bail out the firm.
Three year ago, it took Itachi nine months of pleading, aggravation, and near blackmail to increase school funding by a mere twenty thousand. Forget lab equipment, forget laptops and projector screens, forget new paint coatings and water fountains and closeable lockers and desk upgrades. Forget better, safer buses or healthy cafeteria food.
Just get the students usable textbooks.
A statement he made with a violent slam of a 1991 edition of Modern History that was more history than modern, with the spine all but gone, held poorly by masking tape, pages torn and stained and destroyed by sharpie marks, and a good one-tenth of the book itself missing.
...
It's the walking attitude again. His voice is recognizable anywhere, the right amount of defiance, condescension, and doubt wrapped up in one forceful, coarse tenor.
"Fuck it, Mr. Uchiha, I've had it, man. I'm not ready for September, I never was. First my mum yelling at me, then my friends laughing at me, then my teachers shouting-"
The murmur that follows is too soft to hear. And yet, strong and firm enough to silence the child long enough for him to listen.
By the time Sasuke turns the corner, the door is already closing, the passing glimpse of a braids and dirty sweats.
He walks on past the apartment.
From behind, he hears, "-it's not my fault! I'm not lying, my mum fucking threw..." and the sound of the kitchen sink turned on.
...
As with all other states, New York likens to disagree.
Why same-sex marriage is disastrous.
Five.
Children will be negatively affected. There will be an increase in adopted children by homosexual partners. They will be brought up in an improper environment: open sexuality, queer ideas, nonconformist attitudes. They cannot distinguish traditional gender roles and societal expectations. They will be victims of discrimination at schools.
Four.
The homosexual lifestyle is a vice to society. They carry psychological disorders. They are sexual deviants and perverts. They have high suicide rates and low life expectancy. They are too impulsive and lack self control. None of these are to be encouraged.
Three.
This will transgress traditional family values and morals, change the very fabric of society.
Two.
Marriage is a sacred union of a man and woman. This will defile something held sacred for hundreds of years.
One.
Homosexuality is a sin.
...
As with all other states, New York likens to disagree.
Why opposite-sex marriage is disastrous.
Five.
Children will be negatively affected. Orphaned children have hard time finding adoption. They will be brought up in a improper environment: divorce rates, domestic abuse, adultery, financial weakness. They absorb distinguish traditional gender roles and societal expectations. They will be the proponents of discrimination at schools.
Four.
The heterosexual lifestyle is a vice to society. They carry psychological disorders. They are sexual deviants and perverts. They have high suicide rates and low life expectancy. They are too impulsive and lack self control. None of these are to be encouraged.
Three.
Their ideals of traditional family values and morals are in the form of television dinners and shopping.
Two.
Heterosexual partners have been defiling marriage for hundreds of years with every divorce, adultery, bestiality, and the new idea that marriage is a ritual of love.
One.
Heterosexuality is evil.
...
As with all other states, New York likens to disagree.
Why marriage is disastrous.
The entire system is stupid and makes both parties mutually miserable. Millions of dollars are going down the drain because of people's religious dogma, insisting the government to issue friendship certificates. Remove the tax deductions associated with this religious crap, and people will realize who the fuck they are kidding themselves with.
Also, why are lawmakers fretting over this crap, when funds are nonexistent, unemployment is spiking, and the entire economy is tumbling towards a double dip recession. Oil prices? Four twenty per gallon? Screw the environment. Pipeline from Canada. Now.
...
"Do not take Uncommon Sense seriously," laughs the woman from behind the counter. She hands Sasuke his change and receipt. "I know editor. He is good friend, but he more entertains than informs."
Sasuke places the magazine back down on the stand, and readies to leave with his take out, when the cashier calls for him.
"Wait, Mr. Uchiha."
He waits.
"Is... is Itachi well?"
"Why wouldn't he be."
"He seem very pressure by a bill last week."
...
Ayame immigrated to the United States from South Korea when she was thirty two. Strong academic background, good work ethic, and perseverance. But she was not intelligent, nor attended college. Her marriage never was, and finding a job was hard.
So she took over her father's fast food restaurant. What she cooks takes little skill, but nonetheless delicious. Customers are loyal. Although there are several chain fast food restaurants nearby, with a new Chipotle driving off most competition, the business survived.
The restaurant is only three blocks from the school Itachi works at. He goes there every Friday after extended office hours. He stays with students as late as until eight or nine at night, sometimes treat them to a meal as they run over problem sets again. Other times, they just talk.
He goes there enough times to know the name of the woman behind the counter, invite her to join them when she is on break, engage in friendly discussions. She has seen him enough times to know his name, and sometimes offer special quirks, like a round of milk tea when the soda machine malfunctioned. And they have both seen each other enough times to exchange Christmas presents and see each other outside of the restaurant.
They are friends.
That is all they ever will be.
Her father disapproves of him. He has his eye on another regular, a handsome white man who is on good relations with his daughter. Money to burn and time to kill, and only takes the A train up here for, in all honesty, the best food around. Either him, or the Mexican friend. Reliable and honest, good savings, helped with the family in times of need and provided the man labor when things broke down. Either way, these two candidates do not wear their former commitments on their fingers.
Sasuke disapproves of her. Period.
Warm friendship, trust, and questionable affections will not play a role.
...
Sasuke nearly drops two Styrofoam containers of fried noodles on the sleeping lump nestled on the couch. Likewise, he would have tripped over the precariously stacked pile of math textbooks had he not caught himself.
"It's eleven thirty. Why is he still here?"
The one time he decides to return home, he finds his brother taking up a guest in his absence.
Itachi smiles apologetically. "He will stay for the night."
"Tch."
Sasuke does not even want to know, though he can hazard a guess from the kid's black eye. Either way, the child will not deter him from staying, as he settles down by the kitchen table and methodically unpacks his food.
Itachi notes the plastic bag, with its large smiley and bold THANKYOU. The food is also undeniably familiar.
"How are Ayame and her father?" he questions, pulling up a chair. "Are they well?"
"Why wouldn't they be."
Sasuke has just returned after three weeks of hotel hopping. He is tired of drama. Tonight, they will reconcile.
Tonight, Sasuke will not rip his gradebooks, demand to leave with him out of this craptastic place, try to kiss him. Tonight, Itachi will not mention Sakura yet again, slip him her latest address or phone number.
Tonight, they proceed on a silent agreement: Sasuke will not advance, if Itachi does not retreat.
Tonight, they are just brothers.
...
The walking attitude is stuffing himself with berry filled crepes, stacks of french toast and sausage, cinnamon topped oatmeal, and what he thinks are scrambled eggs, but really not. The green peppers in them are green peppers though. Itachi has finished scooping the last of melon balls, presented a color bowl of orange and green dipped in yogurt, and settled for his own breakfast.
"What is that?" the kid demands, watching his teacher blowing gently on a spoonful.
"Congee."
"Can I try?"
"You might not like it."
The kid insists, and gets his free sample. He grimaces. "So watered down rice."
"Hmm, with bamboo shoots, pickled tofu, and zha cai."
"Nasty." The kid punctuates with a stab of his scrambled eggs and proceeds to scarf down the whole plate. The tomatoes and peppers are diced small enough for him to have given up trying to pick them out.
Itachi hides his smile. "At least the meal is satisfactory?"
"If I say yes, can I come back every morning? It'd be one metro swipe worth it."
"You are always welcome, although there is an old proverb. I believe it roughly translates to: Give a man a fish, you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, you feed him for a lifetime."
"Mr. Uchiha, as great as that sounds, no way in hell my mum is going to learn to cook. You know her idea of breakfast? Diet Special K. Lunch? Hungry Man. Dinner? More Hungry Man, and if we're really lucky, then Chinese take out or some KFC. So unless fishing is some fancy way to say phone numbers to really cheap take out places..."
"You misinterpret me," Itachi politely says. "I said nothing of your mother."
The kid stops. "Then what."
"I am willing to teach you to cook, if you are willing to learn," Itachi says, lifting his bowl in a gesture of good will. "How is your kitchen?"
"We've got... a microwave?"
"It's a start."
...
Sasuke gives his brother one more hour, before it becomes apparent that Itachi plans to dedicate his Saturday to teaching some dropout how to fry fish.
"... four methods: steam, boil, fry, bake-"
The sound of a laptop placed on the kitchen table, as Sasuke proceeds to nonchalantly feed and power on the coffee maker, then return to his typing.
The child stops chopping the carrots and questionably look at the front door, bolted, chain in place. He does not recall hearing it open.
"Sasuke," Itachi greets, withdrawing the yams from the oven. "Your breakfast is in the fridge."
Sasuke ignores and continues typing.
The kid glares at the younger brother, and frowns. "Mr. Uchiha, I thought you said he left on business."
"He did," Itachi replies smoothly, placing a hand on the child's shoulder to refocus his attention on chopping. "The economy is still in trouble. It's his job to-"
The knife slams down. "Fuck up?"
The room falls quiet except for keystrokes, which only infuriates the child more.
"Sorry, Mr. Uchiha." He places the knife down and retrieves his backpack. "I need to get back home."
...
"You need to excuse him," Itachi says as if Sasuke can find anything a thirteen year old says offensive. "His-"
"Let me guess. His father is a ill-tempered loser who cannot keep a steady job. His mother is a negligent narcissist who is milking every cent of welfare she can get her hands on. They both liken to take their own self-created miseries out on their son, who in return, decides to blame Wall Street for his own incompetence in academia."
He continues typing, a little faster.
This is the most prolific Sasuke ever has been with his words, and he realizes, maybe, a thirteen year old doesn't have to be offensive to strike home.
Scum, he thinks, now hitting 120 wpm, wondering if he should just delete the whole letter altogether.
It'd be much easier to rid of the lower strata, the bottom of the gene pool, than to waste any more effect pulling them out. After all, if they don't want to smarten up, save the scraps of their income, secure their children's own future, stop the cycle of poverty when the opportunity has given itself for over a generation now, why should he bother.
He should just tax the shit out of these people, bleed every drop they have, and then kick them out with the reconstruction of a cleaner, whiter neighborhood.
He slams down the enter button.
The chairmen of Community Districts 9, 10, and 11 will be sharing his very unpleasant day.
What an ungrateful bastard.
...
Bailed Out, Sold Out.
Congress announced Tuesday to give a charitable donation of two hundred billion dollars to firms that unapologetically continue to make the world a progressively worse place than it already is.
In return, said firms are given a strict slap to, from now on, not make bonehead fraudulent moves in plain sight, in which taxpayers can find out and get really, really mad.
Stricter regulations are thus enforced to make sure Wall Street does a good job covering their shit up the next time the economy crashes and burns, or at least strategically place blames on other matters, like increasing medicare costs and food money for old people.
I would give the doctors their fair share of sarcasm, but unfortunately, blaming the medical system goes to blaming the insurance industry, which once again goes back to... drumroll, you guessed it, the unapologetic firms that continue to make the world a progressively worse place than it already is.
...
Itachi holds up a letter. "You did this."
Without looking up, "It was in the interest of the firm."
What a blatant lie.
"Thank you."
Sasuke says nothing, only pretending to focus on his copy of Uncommon Sense as if it were a legal document of the utmost importance. It proves difficult, because the trashiness of the articles is on par with those of People or National Enquirer.
He hears movements, and feels his brother join him on the bed.
"I expected you to stop the bill," Sasuke mutters.
A weary smile, as Itachi places his weight on his elbow, the tips of his hair dipping down. "My connections only go so far."
Sasuke stares intensely at a punctuation mark when he says, "What am I."
It catches Itachi off guard. He almost reaches out a hand to hold onto his brother, but stops himself and keeps his distance.
His eyes soften. "You have enough things on your mind. I didn't want to trouble you."
"Tch."
"I'll come to you next time."
The words make Sasuke happier than they should.
...
The skank is the most clairvoyant of the bunch. Every waking moment, she crews on gum, real or imaginary, and holds a track record of failing every class except Political Science, C, and Art History, A. Possibly the most intelligent brain the dump has to offer, and yet, the dumbest because the last real book she's cracked open was the Princess Diaries nine years ago.
She's here because if she fails her next exam, she fails summer school, and fails high school.
"Do I disappoint you, Mr. Uchiha?" she laughs, smacking on a pack of cool mint. She slams her test papers on his chest and invites herself in. She plops on the couch, and observes her surroundings. Quaint, nothing but a small living space and kitchen, a closed door to a claustrophobic bathroom, and an opened door to the bedroom.
It is only her third time here, but she notes the papers and suitcase tucked in the far corners of the bed, and smells the sharp bitterness in the air. Her teacher does not have coffee breath.
"So. You sleep on the couch, or you two sleep together?" she asks, drumming her fingers. Her foot is on the coffee table, legs open in an unmannerly fashion.
"These papers are blank," Itachi redirects the conversation.
"Ye-up." She leans in. "Say, why is your brother still living with you? Isn't he filthy rich?"
Itachi does not grace her with an answer, only traces a finger through the texts in his bookcase.
She continues. "Isn't it gay for two men to be living together?"
"May I ask why you are here?"
"Ain't it obvious? I'm debating whether I can exchange sex for passing grades, or blackmail for said passing grades. Still thinking about the latter. Which do you think the board will like better? Rape of a minor, or homosexual incest?"
A polite smile, as Itachi leans in and places a hand on her bare knee.
"How long can you stay?"
A victorious chew. "Long enough."
"Good." With that, he closes her legs, pushes them off the table, and drops three books on her lap. "Page seventeen. Limits."
...
Sasuke returns to the sounds of moaning.
"Oh my god... no more... no shit that's- no, no, I get it, I get it, you can put that away now!"
A roll of toilet paper smacks Sasuke square in the face just as he enters the apartment. Neither party looks up from the problem set.
"Five pi." She slaps the paper down, and stands up.
"You are free to leave."
"Fuck you."
Just before she makes her leave, she glares at Sasuke. "Fuck you too," she spits in his face.
"Your retest is Thursday," Itachi reminds just as she files out.
...
1988.
A father locked in another country for political treason. A mother who worked in a laundry mat in the dirty segregation of Chinatown. A boy who stared at two peaking towers in the lower districts of Manhattan, the very emblem of the country's power and wealth.
He wasn't like the others in the district, scrapping together pennies and kissing shoes for a green card.
He belonged in a world of wealth and power and extravagance, the leaders controlling the fate of billions of subjects. He was enriched in aristocratic education and thought. He already carved down his ambition, as he walked down the halls of Stuyvesant. The best education would serve him.
But the best education went only so far as its best teacher.
No one would have thought their perfect valedictorian had once struggled in something as easy as elementary calculus, struggled and almost lost until a figure waltzed in and elegantly unraveled the answers with a simple roll of toilet paper.
...
The summer is ending. By some stretch of a miracle, Itachi convinces eight of them to not drop out, and continue onto fall of the school year.
That one week break in between when Itachi leaves his office and he retakes it again for September, Sasuke takes his vacation. He doesn't care if the firm just suffered its biggest blow in history, and Ino threatens to feed his guts to the pigs if he disappears now. He's gone.
The stroll in Central Park is peaceful. The pigeons even regain their charm, stops being overstuffed rats on the sidewalk that Sasuke occasionally wants to crush with his feet.
The Met offers a new exhibition, and for Itachi, who carries enough knowledge, observes the paintings on display with a smile on his features that recalls the Mona Lisa. His smile becomes Sasuke's own distraction.
Somewhere along the way, Sasuke entertains him with the bourgeoisie life. There once was a time he wished Dean & DeLuca burned to the ground. But not today, when they sit for a nice cup of tea and try hundred dollar wine truffles for the hell of it. Their guards are dropping. Sasuke accidentally reveals the eccentric magazine he has been hiding behind for the past month, and his older brother is laughing.
The past years, Sasuke lost this week of this because of one-sided fighting. This time around, nothing is going to make him lose it again.
Not Itachi.
Not himself.
Not even the curious shake of a 5.8 earthquake that makes the condiment jars rattle, nor the wrath of the howling Irene. The world can end later.
...
She reappears.
Columbia University. A lecturer this time, not a student. The woman to make the speech in front of the accepted 2015 class.
Her second priority is to find her husband. But instead, finds herself in an embrace with her old classmate and friend.
"Sorry Sakura, the bastard's not here," Ino scowls.
Sakura raises an eyebrow, notes the laptop sitting on the empty desk. Her husband is not the type to leave such an important thing behind.
Ino catches her gaze. "I've got connections. Shikamaru's an excellent hacker."
Sakura scoffs, shakes her head, and boldly swivels her husband's chair around. She plops down.
It takes her eleven tries. The last password works, and it isn't long before she is pulling up his files and browsing through his web history. She doesn't need his email account, nor anything else to follow his train of thought. Ten minutes later, she takes a taxi to upper Manhattan.
...
Sasuke closes the door in her face.
As if that would make her disappear.
...
She is fine with his method.
She takes out a yellow envelope, and slips it under the crack of the door. She isn't here for him. She is here for business, and to catch up with an old friend, before heading back to Baltimore. Otherwise, she would have just emailed him the divorce files.
She left two years ago.
She didn't leave because of anything dramatic like abuse or adultery or even an insult. She left because she wanted to know something.
One week was enough to answer her, but she loved him and gave him two years instead. And in that generous gap of time, he did not use a second of it to chase her down, make a single phone call, or even ask himself why his wife is gone. The message could not have been more clear:
He doesn't care.
So now, she doesn't either.
...
Itachi is gone for groceries.
Sasuke sits on the couch, stares at the sealed envelope, and turns the ring on his finger. He contemplates whether to throw both out.
In the end, he leaves the ring alone. There is a reason he wears it in the first place, and that reason has not changed.
...
It is Itachi who finally opens the envelope that has been on the coffee table for the past month, buried under English papers and old newspapers.
He doesn't touch Sasuke's processions, but it is obvious that his brother left it out for him.
He closes his eyes and tucks the files back in. He has too many recommendation letters to write, and not enough time, energy, nor heart to face anything else for the night.
...
Itachi married relatively early, at the age of twenty two to a student from Florence. Of the time, he was a handsome youth, she was a beauty by any standard. Their first meeting was in a library and museum, she directing the exhibition of her first love and passion: Leonardo da Vinci. Historian, renaissance expert, artist. Even her features were undeniably suiting, as if someone had breathed life into one of the paintings and brought the virgin to life.
One conversation was all it took for her to find her renaissance man.
They married eight months of when they first met, and but never stopped loving the other until they departed in eight years.
Blood was dripping down her cheek, but she found the strength to smile to him and boldly point an index finger to the magnificent autumn sky. Then, she brought her unborn son with her to heaven.
...
When Sasuke hears the door unlock, he isn't expecting a third wheel, much less an semi-conscious one limping in the arms of her teacher. Baggy pants, tipped hat, bloodstained jersey.
"History SAT," Sasuke states blandly, settling the paper down. He owes his brother enough to be considerate. He evacuates the couch and grabs ice from the fridge.
"It was," Itachi sighs. "It was difficult to persuade the parole officer."
A sudden sharp hiss, when Itachi removed the staining baseball cap and pressed the bag of ice to the child's head. "FUCK!"
Sasuke is about to retrieve a pack of pain killers, when Itachi shakes his head.
"You're kidding," Sasuke deadpans.
"Her liver."
"You're kidding. Doesn't she already have a class A misdemeanor."
"She wasn't carrying in her pockets this time around, so they couldn't hold her. That isn't to say it's not in her bloodstream."
"Fuck, fuck, fuck..." Her strength wears down and she goes limp. She cracks open her eyes, hazily stares into Sasuke's direction. "Tell me your brother smokes."
"He does not." Itachi's voice is polite, kind, but it makes her nervous, because it almost sounds disappointed.
"Buy me a pack then. There's a convenience store down the block, you know."
Sasuke has enough. A dropout, fine. Poor, stupid, rude, hopeless, fine. But criminal is where he draws the line, and they will not be housing a druggie, much less one that acts as if she owns the place.
"Get her out of here," he hisses.
"Sasuke." Itachi's voice is weary, and same with his expression, as he pleads for his brother to not give him any more trouble for the night.
It is here Sasuke sees the shadows under his brother's eyes, and the thin strands of premature grey hair. He clenches his fist.
"History SAT," he spits, then files into the bedroom.
...
Sasuke seizes her hand, before she can pocket the watch on the nightstand.
He forces her out of the bedroom, careful to not wake up his brother.
"You have some nerve." His voice is chillingly calm as he pushes her into the kitchen.
She chuckles darkly. "Says the man who shares a bed with his own brother. Not like you can't afford another mattress... Or house." She eyes the watch in his grip, before looking at him in the eye. "It's an every night thing, isn't it."
"You'll never know, because you are never coming back here."
"Like I want to be in a house of faggots."
Sasuke's fist is inching.
"What you fail to understand, I believe, is the amount of raw power I have to make your pathetic life hell," he hisses. "It is not difficult to remove you, or your entire neighborhood with a simple call from the Department of Public Housing and Health. Even easier is to strip your family of all income and sink them in their own debt. Or perhaps the best punishment is to take you off the streets for life on a class A felony. A minor status will not save you; I have plenty of connections to merciless prosecutors. If you like drugs, then I can facilitate you with a medical ward, the ones that bind you to chairs, inject you with eight different needles a day."
The glare is harsh, and his words icy, as he corners her against the window.
She fights back a shiver. "Heh, you're woofing."
He is dead serious. There is a height difference, and lighting isn't forgiving, the shadows sharpening his features. His eyes say everything: trash. Dirty, filthy, pathetic trash, and how to best rid of it without Itachi knowing the wiser.
It scares her. It's something she doesn't see when she's in this apartment, because her teacher is the idiot who doesn't notice her steal from him three times as she pretends to study. Her teacher is the fool who forces her to class, and stays until nine at night running over homework that she obviously hasn't bothered to even try.
Her teacher looks at her in respect, dignity... hope.
His younger brother is different.
Stop staring at her like that. She's not trash, a cockroach, a fuck up who can't even tell what her own gender is, born to two fat retards.
She wants to beat him up, show him who the fuck he thinks he's messing with. She could probably mess up his jaw real bad too. But a part keeps her on a leash. The part her teacher planted in her that asks her to rethink the consequences before doing what is undeniably something stupid.
"U.S. History. October first. If you do not take it, if you do not get an eight hundred, if you upset my brother like this again, then I am making that phone call." Sasuke heads back to bed. "What else you do with your life, I don't care."
...
We are the 99%
On this glorious September seventeenth, the people ready their pickets, pitchforks, and rotten tomatoes in a revolutionary and long overdue protest of how badly Wall Street fucked up this time.
In response, the companies have expressed their "regret," while their leaders are, presumably, hiding being a fortified wall of lawyers. As cries of dismay and condemnation echo the park, one CEO greets this commotion as a wondrous opportunity to, of course, make more money, mainly a renewed investment in companies associated with the distribution of pickets, pitchforks, and fruits of overripe nature.
...
"Tough day?" Itachi expresses his sympathies. His fledglings crowded around the kitchen table do not share his sentiment.
Sasuke closes the door. Actually, he didn't go to work. Spent his morning at a local Starbucks, finished last Friday's crossword in the Times. But they don't have to know.
The kitchen is packed. It's SAT cram season. For many, this will be their last chance to take the test before college applications. And they will apply, and they will go to college. It doesn't have to be Stanford, nor an Ivy League. A state college is fine, a community or technical school is fine.
"Number fifteen?" Itachi questions everyone.
"D."
"A."
"A."
"E."
"... C?"
"It is D."
The walking attitude smirks victoriously, swivels the pencil between his fingers. Fifteen in a row now. Maybe he really can get a perfect score, maybe he can succeed in the charter school, maybe he can try the math team, get into MIT, and be the electrical engineer he mumbled he wanted to be the first day he came here.
Maybe.
That sense of maybe is all it takes to push people towards yes.
...
"She loved you," Itachi whispers, clutching tightly onto his brother's shoulder.
Sasuke says nothing, only fills the documents. He has pushed both him and Sakura past their limits, stretched their relationship stretched further and further, while impassively waiting for the snap. Now, it finally has.
It is only after everything broke apart that he sees what Itachi has seen this entire time. That Sakura did love him deeply, a depth of two long years of crying her tears dry in empty hotels, holding tightly onto a phone that never rang.
It would have been so easy to get her back, but he didn't.
"Why," Itachi murmurs, closing his eyes. "Why did you give her up."
Sasuke notes the schedule for his court date, then closes his laptop.
"It wasn't fair to either of us," he says.
...
Why did he strive so hard in school.
Why did he enter the corporation that he did.
Why did he marry and buy a house.
Why did he achieve the quintessential American Dream only to throw it all away: the house and the wife, the children and future, possibly his job and reputation and the labor of thirty seven years of work.
Why did he wait until this late to do so.
Half of his life, Sasuke has been living society's precious, precious dream, a dream that seemed invaluable to give up: the woman, the money, the career, the home.
The second half of his life, Sasuke will live his own dream.
There is no alcohol this time, because Itachi has given in, understands Sasuke has no intention of going back, understands Sasuke cannot go back even if he wants to now.
It's okay. They are both excellent actors. The world can gossip all they want, but no one will ever really know.
...
It's officially the end of the world
Everyone knows about the hodgepodge that is the expected apocalypse of 12/21/12. First we have the 2011 super tornado. Then we take on an earthquake. Then there's a hurricane. And now, this respectful journalist wakes up one morning, dons on his newly invested autumn jacket and shoes, readies his camera for the idyllic mirage of orange around Central Park, and BAM, has his beautiful face greeted by five tons of snow, ice, and motherflipping seafoam.
Yes, break out the shovels ladies and gentlemen, because a blizzard welcomes us this fair October day, and doesn't seem to be stopping soon. The city is calling for temporarily indoor imprisonment. The metro is dead. And the poor student who did not save his thesis before his power is cut... you have my pity.
Obviously, mother nature is pissed at us for something. Maybe we transgressed her laws, maybe this is divine punishment in the form of protein rich puffy goodness.
But considering the shitload of problems everyone has, I'm not surprised.
Consider this a friendly reminder: shit's going down, so better hit that bucket list.
Don't die without living first.
...
Itachi hangs up the phone.
"Well?"
"800," he says calmly. "She told me to thank you." Itachi does not appear more confused than amused.
"Then do it."
When they kiss, there is nothing but the dim hum of the heater, and flurries of seafoam whipping in the street outside.
This is the fourth time Sasuke knows how he got here, compared to the four or more times he didn't.
Likewise, this is the third time he knows how he got here but did not leave the scene first.
This is the second time he did not want to leave.
And this is the first time neither of them does.