The Wallpaper
Chapter Eleven
To Spin, To Speed
Some things in our lives are just too painful to acknowledge, and the depth of something tragic really does not hit home for quite some time.
To Shuichi, his two best friends running away from him had just the same impact as though they had died. Gone, they were utterly and completely gone and there seemed little chance of seeing them again, despite Hiroshi's reassurance in his letter that they would.
Shuichi sighed, glancing around at his small, crappy apartment. Currently he could be found spending the cold afternoon cleaning everything up; throwing sheet after sheet of Suguru's and Hiroshi's music into boxes. On top of those, he carefully placed all of his notebooks, containing years of lyrics. Shuichi found it completely pointless to keep such things lying around. What good would it do?
After a while, all that really remained in sight were three cardboard boxes stacked in the corner, a keyboard and a guitar in its case next to them leaning against two small amps, two beds and two nightstands. Really, not much of a change, but Shuichi felt as though the room had become oddly empty, lifeless.
In his tiredness, he laid himself carefully onto the queen bed that once had cradled Hiroshi and Suguru to sleep. With a roll, he wrapped himself in the blankets and snuggled into a comfortable position, letting his eyes fall shut as his body sank into the oblivion of sleep.
Earlier that morning.
"Hey Eiri?"
"Don't call me that, brat."
"What do you do to pay rent?"
After Shuichi asked that question, Eiri stood quite quickly, letting Shuichi fall hard from his lap to the floor.
"Ow, hey come on, I was only asking you a question-"
"And the answer is certainly none of your business." Eiri snapped, making his way to the kitchen. With a harsh pull, he opened the rusty old fridge door and pulled out the last beer; as a matter of fact, the last thing actually in the fridge was indeed that beer.
"Oh don't give me that bullshit! I'm so damn sick and tired of you not being even the slightest bit honest with me! You have nightmares constantly, you never sleep right, you have two names for God's sake, I just... Why the hell won't you tell me anything? I can't stand this! It's one mystery after another when it comes to you!" Shuichi shouted in frustration, pulling at his hair. He stood quickly and walked up to Eiri, grabbing the beer out of the older teen's hand and throwing it on the kitchen floor.
The loud noise from the shattering glass went unheard as Eiri glared down at Shuichi. How dare this kid make demands of him? This little brat knows nothing of what Eiri suffers through – could never understand...
"Maybe if you didn't have the intelligence level of a gold fish I might consider bothering with you, but you are too simple and stupid to even try and comprehend any of that. You raise yourself too damn high, you know that? You are nothing to me but a bed warmer and nothing I say or do seems to get that point across to you. Stop bothering me with questions, stop trying to "get to know me". I don't love you, I don't even like you. You are an easy lay and nothing more." If Eiri had pulled a sharp piece of glass from the pile on the floor and pushed it through Shuichi's heart, the pain would still never compare to how deep those words had dug.
Shuichi stumbled backward from the sheer hate of the words, and with a harsh sob, ran from the apartment.
Eiri sighed, running a hand through his hair.
Pulling on his clothes, Eiri made his way out the door and to Seguchi's office, a bit early, but he had nothing better to do.
Two weeks passed before Eiri got the nerve to talk to Shuichi. He had not seen, or heard from the kid at all. As a matter of fact, there had been no sign of Hiroshi and Suguru at all either.
Eiri had the fault of being a greatly stubborn person, but over the last few days the absence of a good meal courtesy of Shuichi had worn down his defenses. He decided to suck it up, and say that on Seguchi's orders he had to check and make sure the brat had not died. However great Eiri's faults were, he did have skill when it came to making up lies.
Without bothering to knock, Eiri pushed open the door and with a cool air to him, strided into the single room apartment.
He found Shuichi laying on the first bed to the left of the door, sprawled about. Dirty dish after dirty dish could be found scattered about the floor surrounding the bed, on the nightstand and even on the bed, as though Shuichi had just been camping out on the queen for the last two weeks.
Tip toeing over the plates as to not step on any of them, he reached the bed and roughly shook Shuichi. "Oy, brat! Wake up!"
Shuichi grumbled, and sat up slowly, rubbing his eyes. "What do you want," Shuichi snapped in a scratchy voice.
Eiri glared down at the brat, about ready to feed Shuichi his well-rehearsed reason, when a clearing of a throat from behind stopped him.
Eiri turned slowly, mindful of the dirty dishes, to find none other than Tohma Seguchi in the doorway of the apartment.
The blond smiled sweetly at the two, walking further into the apartment.
"I do hope I'm not interrupting anything, but I must have a word with Mr. Shindou here about the absence of his two roommates. I uh, how do you say, need to arrange it so that Shuichi is now in charge of payment for this apartment, since it appears as though his two roommates have moved out." His smile turned sick and sinister, as though he had made some clever joke. He had the impression that neither Shuichi nor Eiri had any idea about how that apartment had been paid for previously.
Oh, but they knew. Shuichi's mouth dropped slightly in fear and Eiri's eyes widened ever so slightly.
Seguchi...he could not possibly mean...
Eiri turned to look at Shuichi, and at that moment they both were consumed with fear.
"I can't believe this." Shuichi grumbled, wrapping his arms around his knees.
Eiri sighed and took a seat next to Shuichi on the orange carpet of his apartment floor.
He had no words to comfort the brat. Even if he did he probably would refrain from saying them.
"So you for sure have to have sex with him then?" Eiri asked, picking at the fuzz of the carpet.
Shuichi mumbled and started to rub his legs slowly.
"He didn't detail, just said to meet him Friday, next week in his office. Pretty clear what he wants though." The atmosphere became heavy on the both young men's shoulders.
The cold of the winter did nothing to sever the heat of their fear.
Eiri could not help but sympathize with Shuichi.
The room seemed to be closing in on them. The ugly flowers of the wallpaper were dancing around, mocking their pitiful lives.
How the hell did Eiri end up here? His head ached at the thought, the memories of hands over his skin, of blood pooling around him. Vomit rose in his mouth as his mind began to fill with image after image of a gun, of arms and bodies, of blood and shouts.
Eiri felt faint; his mind spinning, his heart aching, everything going red and black and-
Then it became dark again. Eiri opened his eyes and looked to his left to find his hand being held tightly. He examined the smaller hand that grasped his with a seeming intention of never letting go.
"Eiri I don't know what to do." Shuichi whispered in a soft sob.
Eiri looked at the mop of pink hair beside him, giving the smaller hand a tight squeeze.
"So are you going to apologize, or am I only here because you're hungry?" Shuichi asked loudly from the kitchen, turning the egg in the pan.
"Well, I wouldn't say that. I'm hungry and horny you know. I'm not that shallow." Eiri replied, turning a page the newspaper Shuichi had been so kind to give him.
Shuichi said a few choice words under his breath as he carried the plate of eggs and bacon into the room. Walking over to Eiri, he sat next to him. Plucking the newspaper out of Eiri's hand, he set the plate in the older teen's lap.
"I was reading that punk." Eiri growled as he picked up a piece of bacon.
"But now you are eating. Didn't you ever learn any manners? You don't eat and read. It's rude." Shuichi chided, gazing lazily at the page Eiri had been reading.
Shuichi sighed and turned to the previous page, reading the front of the newspaper.
Monday, January 4th.
Not finding anything more interesting then the sound of Eiri chewing, he flipped two pages forward.
' MOST WANTED: Eiri Uesugi Still on the Loose January 4th marks the third anniversary of the search for Eiri Uesagi, for the murder he allegedly committed. Police are searching desperately for Uesagi for questioning in the murder of the famous novelist, Yuki Kitazawa and the assault of two others, who wish to remain unidentified. Police responded to the crime scene after a 9-1-1 call from one of the two anonymous victims. Said victim claimed to have been hit unconscious over the head with a gun, the other shot and badly wounded. Yuki Kitazawa was killed before authorities reached his apartment by a bullet through his heart. Uesugi's whereabouts are unknown as of currently, and the public is urged to be on the lookout for him.'
End Chapter Eleven.
I really don't know if it was January 4th when the incident happened with Eiri and Yuki or not, work with me here.
Sorry this took forever. I'm on summer vacation now! I should finish this soon!
I don't know if you call the police in Japan by 911, but I really couldn't care less.
Next Chapter: Shuichi knew before courtesy of Hiro that Eiri had committed some sort of crime, but had just brushed it off as an exaggeration since the topic was never subject of conversation again. However, this newspaper article leaves the two in a bad position. Shuichi is about to get a plate full, and Eiri can't avoid questions anymore. And what does Tohma have up his sleeve?