At first - 4

Sound

It happened so suddenly that at first Kubota hadn't registered it. One moment went right into the next, and it was gone. He thought he must have heard wrong. It seemed too strange of a thing to happen that it must have been a mistake on his part. So, he let it pass without any notice that he'd heard anything.

The second time it happened, he looked up, not bothering to hide the surprise on his face. "What"

"I said 'Do you got any milk?' This stuff tastes like crap without it." Tokitoh tapped the coffee cup that Kubota had just handed him.

"Oh, uh...yes. One moment." He got up, and as he walked to the fridge, he stuck his finger in his ear and turned it back and forth. Had he just heard correctly?

He got the milk and turned back to the living room. Tokitoh sat on the couch, wrapped in two blankets as he watched the TV. His right hand lay underneath the folds of the blankets while the other held the remote.

He'd finally "graduated" from the bed a week earlier, and now spent almost every waking moment in front of the television, watching everything he could, and letting Kubota know his opinions on all of it. There were the cooking shows ("Hey, can you make that? Can you? Can you"), music videos ("Man, do these guys suck"), nature documentaries ("Whoa, check this out! They fight by throwing shit at each other"), and even the news ("What's a...'felony'? That guy has twelve of them. Is that why he's going to 'jail'?)

Most of their conversations were about what was on TV. After their initial introductions, when he said "Hi, I'm Kubota", and Tokitoh responded with a silent but effective "Hi, this is my fist", they didn't have much to say to each other, even though they spent so much time together. One morning, several days after he had woken up, Tokitoh said his name. He looked out the window when he said it. "That's all I know though." He turned to look at Kubota then, his gaze hard. "So don't bother asking me anything else 'cause I don't know it."

"Fair enough." Kubota hadn't felt the need to share anything about himself either, so this seemed like a perfect relationship. Don't ask, don't tell, and don't know.

With no past to share, their conversations were taken up with either what was for dinner or what was on TV, some words more heartfelt than others.

"What? Again"

Kubota only smiled in return as he put the plate of rice and brown curry on the table. It amused him that someone being taken care of by another would fight so vigilantly about what was being served for dinner. It was so different from the fake politeness that he had met most of his life, but then, everything about Tokitoh was different.

He reasoned that the difference must be why things had continued like this- from a few days to weeks, from the alley to the bedroom to the living room, from a fistful of silence to their media-focused conversations. He went back to the pot of curry and ladled out a portion onto his plate.

It must be because it's so different that it's come to this...

"Kubo-chan, I need a spoon."

His hand stilled, and slowly, he turned his head to look back at the table. "What"

"A spoon. If I gotta eat this stuff" Tokitoh gave him a sour look and tapped the plate"I'm gonna need something to eat it with."

Kubota turned back to the pot and looked down at it. He'd forgotten why he was standing there. He then noticed his plate, and it clicked back into place. Dinner- food- eat. "Right. Spoon." He put down the ladle and reached for the drawer. "Spoon-spoon-spoon." It was like a mantra, bringing him back from his thoughts, the ones that kept buzzing in his mind, saying "He said something else."

He took out the spoon and handed it to him. "Enjoy."

"Whatever." Tokitoh turned back to his plate and started to eat.

Later, when they were sitting on the couch, Kubota noticed the quiet that had fallen on the living room. The television still played, a comedy variety about guests who competed by throwing pudding ("Hey, it's just like the monkeys from before"), but after twenty minutes, Tokitoh's comments had stopped. Kubota turned to look over and saw his head leaning against the side of the couch, his eyes closed.

He picked up the blanket that had fallen on to the floor and placed it over him. He reached for the remote, but then realized that turning off the TV might create too much quiet, enough to wake up to. He left it on, and instead, got up himself. As quietly as possible, he opened the sliding door to the balcony, stepped out, and closed the door so little of the winter air could get inside. He walked up to the edge and leaned against it, and he could feel the cold concrete through his shirt.

With the door closed, he could barely hear the TV. Outside, the wind blew by the side of the building, and some cars drove on the street below. Besides that, it was all quiet.

He took out a cigarette and lit it, and listened to his own breath as he sighed out the smoke.

The only times he heard quiet now, the only time the TV wasn't playing, was when Tokitoh fell asleep, always in his bed, while Kubota stretched out on the couch. It was only then that he heard the slight noises the building made, or the wind outside, or the sound of one person in a room again.

He didn't know if he missed it- the quiet that filled his apartment before. He hadn't shared his living space with anyone since he'd moved out of Kasai's, and even back then, they never really talked. Here, the noise was almost constant, and if it wasn't from the TV, it was from Tokitoh- talking, complaining, fighting, laughing-

It was...so different...unexpected...Even though he brought him to the apartment, everything else after that had worked out in ways he couldn't have foreseen, just like Tokitoh's "hello". Furious and angry and so loud and-

"Damn, it's cold out here."

Kubota stopped staring at the street below and turned around. He saw that the door to the living room was open, and standing next to it, wrapped in a blanket, was Tokitoh.

When had he opened the door? Why didn't I hear it?

Tokitoh stepped out and walked over until he stood next to him. "What are you looking at"

Kubota turned back to look down . The cars were gone. The street was quiet and empty. "Nothing. I was just thinking."

"About what"

Kubota looked back at him. This seemed to be going past their "don't ask-don't tell" agreement, but somehow, he didn't mind. "About how quiet it was."

"Oh." Tokitoh kept his gaze on the street below, but he hugged the blanket closer. "Like, it's too quiet, or not quiet enough"

"That it's just...quiet. And how it's different now."

"Different good or different bad"

"Just different. You know what I mean"

"No." Tokitoh shook his head.

Kubota shrugged. "I guess I can't explain this one."

"Oh." He frowned, took a last look out, and then turned back to the door. "I'm going back in."

Kubota watched through the glass as Tokitoh stood in the living room, the blanket still around him. He stared at the TV for a moment, then picked up the remote and turned it off. Then he left down the hall- maybe to the bath or the bedroom.

Watching through the glass, it was like his living room was his own TV show, but now off and empty. He opened the door, and standing there, half in and half out, he could hear the sound of water running. Tokitoh must be in the washroom.

He shivered, and realization of the cold hit him finally. He stepped all the way inside and closed the door. He listened to the water running until it stopped, and in the quiet that was left, he reached over to the remote, and turned on the TV.

Tokitoh found him stretched out on the couch, a book in his hands.

"I guess I'm gonna go to bed." He stood there in the doorway to the hall, moving neither towards the living room nor to the bedroom. His next question wasn't spoken out loud, but Kubota figured what it was.

Is this the night I take back my bed? Is this the time I say "enough"?

He put his book down. "I'm going to read for a bit longer so I think I'll just bunk out here. See you in the morning." He smiled.

"You gonna read with that on" Tokitoh pointed to the TV.

Kubota looked and saw that the earlier news had turned into one of the late-night varieties, the one where young woman did stunts in bikinis. "Yes." He smiled back to Tokitoh who just gave him a strange look. "I find that..." He thought about it for a moment, but no better explanation came then "I like the sound of it." He turned back to his book.

"You're a weird guy, Kubo-chan."

He didn't look up in surprise this time. "I know."

"Night."

"Good night."

He turned down the TV a little as he heard him walk down the hall and close the bedroom door. As the variety program continued on in the background, he stared at the same page of his book, thinking.

He had heard him correctly. "...Kubo-chan"

But he realized that it was also something that he liked the sound of.