"Irashaimase!" A blooming teenager bowed his head humbly, letting his jet-black bangs hang, obscuring his smooth, youthful face. The color of his hair and eyes contrasted sharply with his pale, yellow tinged skin. He would normally stick out in a crowd of diverse people, but there was no such thing here. This was downtown Osaka, and everybody that passed his bowed head looked just like him. But they weren't. It was hard being a person of Chinese ancestry living in Japan. Discrimination against other oriental cultures was occasional, subtle, but strong. Combine that with the fact that with such a conservative culture, people often harbored ignorant, stereotypical views towards street bums, life was extremely tough for a teen trying to make his mark on the world … a teen like Kenneth Feng.
But Kenny never let any of that bother him. He did his job … working as a waiter in one of Osaka's many okonomiyaki food joints … with diligence, his head held higher than anybody else's, even with his shorter stature.
"Kenny – kun," a deep voice boomed, one that he recognized as being the voice of his boss. "Osoi yo."
"Fuck you," Kenny hissed under his breath. "I got here five minutes early, I'm not late!" He turned around to face his boss, an even shorter man than he was with a pot-belly and a receding hairline. He plastered a fake smile onto his face and spoke politely to his superior. "Sou desu ga, kesa hayaku kitan desu …"
"Hayaku kitandakedo, soto de tabako wo suttanda yo!" That was impossible. How did the boss know he'd be smoking outside? Kenny made absolutely sure he made no noise as he went outside for his pre-shift cigarette. It must've been the smell.
Spending a good deal of his life in Raccoon City down in the United States, Kenny grew up with the habit of taking no shit from anybody. But in a deeply rooted Asian culture, such new age sentiment was not looked fondly upon. So Kenny just bit his lip and bowed his head for the thousandth time that day."Hontou ni sumimasen." He hated suppressing that mouthy part of him. It was never easy for him to curb the snappy words that threatened to spill forth from his lips.
"Raishuu kimi ga osokattara …" The boss wagged his finger at him, about to threaten Kenny if he was late again next week.
"Wakarimashita!" One thousand and one! Again, bowing his head, simultaneously cutting his boss off in mid sentence. He couldn't help but let a little mischievous grin spread across his face, unseen to the boss for his face was now facing the floor. Kenny said he understood, but in reality, he could've caredless what his boss thought. The guy was a fat bully anyway. Today wasn't the first time he tried to bust Kenny for doing something wrong. His co-workers knew he was a hard working kid. It was just that fat jerk, the only one who had a bone to pick with him for no apparent reason.
Kenny's boss, Mr. Takayama spun on his heals, "Like a revolving planet," Kenny thought, and stomped off into the kitchen. He pulled a pen from behind his ear and proceeded back to the front of the restaurant to greet an approaching guest. A pleasant ringing sound dinged throughout the restaurant, alerting its employees to a new customer. Kenny bowed his head again, "Irashai …"
But the customer stared strangely at him with green eyes, behind locks of bright red hair. Now here was somebody different … "So submissive," the foreigner half joked, "I'm not used to seeing you like this, Kenny."
Kenny looked up from the ground. His eyes widened in surprise at the other young man, looking at least a decade or so more mature. "Cranky!" he wrapped his arms around the foreigner's waist, as the other did the same, both laughing obnoxiously and wanting to cry.
"You little shit," Cranky said, looking his friend up and down. "It's been so long since I've seen you. You've grown!"
"God, how long has it been?" Kenny asked. "About nine years, I think."
"You didn't tell me you were going down to America to live for awhile!" "I wanted a good education. And since English has been the fad in Japan for … how long now … I decided to do something about my future."
"How long have you been back?" Cranky asked.
"About a month."
"And you landed a job this quickly? I'm proud of you, man. You got time for a smoke?"
"Hold on, let me ask my supervisor," Kenny replied. There was no way in hell he was going to ask Mr. Takayama. So he approached one of the waitresses instead. "Ohirugohan wo tabeni ittemo ii desu ka?" He asked for lunch, but a cigarette was what he really needed.
"Hai," the girl replied politely, bowing her head back. She only did it because Kenny was a boy and she was a girl, another form of discrimination he didn't like about this country. "Chotto Takayama-san ni oshiete ni ikimasu ne." Oh god, she was going to tell the boss.
"Let's get out of here," Kenny suggested, running for the door with Cranky trailing behind. The pair of them left the building through the front door, both of them pulling a pack of cigarettes from their pockets. Cranky reached over and handed Kenny his pack, receiving a curious look as a result.
"I've held onto these for you, since before you left," he said, smiling.
"Aww, thanks!" Kenny replied, happily taking it. "I wonder if they're still good."
"Smoking is never good," Cranky retorted, not unlike a parent would. "And I hoped you would've quit by now."
"Hey, if you don't smoke, why did you suggest going for one?"
"I was testing you."
Kenny shrugged. "Sorry to disappoint."
As the pair of them stood around a neighboring alley, Kenny breathing the poisonous toxins into his body, they noticed yet another pair of foreigners walk by. The woman had a long, slender body. Her lean arms swung gracefully by her sides, her light blue sleeveless dress in sharp contrast with her light brown skin. Her long, toned legs moved quickly, like a model walking to some unheard beat down a runway. Long wavy hair flowed around her shoulders and face, on which she wore a pair of sport sunglasses.
Kenny stared in amazement. "She's beautiful, huh?" he asked, eyeing her as she walked by. The man walking with her had long strawberry blond hair, shorter than hers, yet long for a man. He wore a dark brown suede jacket with a red wife beater underneath. Baggy blue jeans almost completely covered the white runners on his feet.
"You better quit staring," Cranky pointed out, "he looks like he was ripped straight out of a men's fitness magazine."
The man was the first to catch the both of them whispering. "Aw, shit," Kenny cursed. "Now he's gonna tell us to stop staring."
"I'll take care of it," Cranky offered, standing protectively in front of his friend. Cranky was a force to reckon with himself, a big change from the skinny kid he remembered from nine years ago. He had bulked up quite a bit in those nine years, his shoulders, arms and chest adorned with defined slabs of muscle. His bright red hair was a reference to the fury deep within his body that would've otherwise gone unnoticed.
The stranger approached Cranky without any immediate aggression. He just strode over nonchalantly, his brows furrowed at the two longtime friends out of curiosity more than anything. Kenny twisted his neck, trying to get a good view of the man from behind Cranky's broad form. Cranky stood his ground and stared the man straight in the eye with his most ferocious glare. But the stranger seemed more amused and curious than frightened – with good reason too. If the two of them got into a fight, it would definitely be a good one. The stranger looked over Cranky's shoulder at Kenny, causing Cranky to sidestep, coming in between the two of them again.
"If you want him," Cranky said, tipping his head backwards towards Kenny, "you have to get through me first."
"Hold on a sec …" Kenny said, noticing something strangely familiar about the stranger. He then glanced at his wife, who was now approaching, removing the sunglasses from her face with a single graceful swipe of her arm across her face. She was beautiful alright, but there was something else about the woman that was very alluring to Kenny. It wasn't love, nor was it lust, but she seemed so …
The man suddenly spoke in perfectly accented Japanese, catching Kenny off guard. "Do you remember me?"
Kenny's first response was to tell the guy no. But then again, they were giving off a strange energy. There was definitely something familiar about them, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it.
"Why would we?" Cranky snapped quickly.
"Ah … Uncle Ken?" Kenny asked, much to his surprise. Kenny fake coughed into his hand, unsure of what he just said. The words just came out all of a sudden, without him even commanding it. He didn't even know if that was the man's name, let alone whether he was an uncle or not.
"So you do remember," the man said, smiling. "Uncle Ken." He nodded his head in approval. "It's been awhile since I've been called that."
"Who are you?" Kenny asked. "And your wife?"
"I'm Mr. Masters," came the reply.
Kenny stepped back in shock. Within a second, his heart rate dramatically increased, his hands became clammy, this throat suddenly felt like sandpaper. "Y…you're joking me."
Mr. Masters shook his head. "You probably wouldn't remember what I look like, but I know you know who I am."
"You're the guy responsible for funding my trip over to America," Kenny said, pointing a shaky finger.
"And just about every aspect of your financial life," he added proudly.
"Those two thousand dollars you deposit into my bank account every month …" Kenny continued. "That was … you?!"
Mr. Masters shrugged. "Who did you expect?"
"I don't know. I never thought about it before."
"Not very many people do this for a complete stranger," Mr. Masters said.
"Then why did you do it for me?" Kenny asked.
"Because …" the man paused. "You …" His beautiful wife approached him and put her hand on his shoulder. She ran her hand up and down his arm and whispered words of encouragement into his ear, pausing in mid sentence and gave Kenny a warm smile. "Nine years ago ..." Mr. Masters managed to spill out.
"What about that time?" Kenny continued his interrogation.
"It was a significant time for you."
Again, Kenny broke out in a wave a cold sweat, the second one within a minute. How did he know all this? Who did this … Mr. Masters think he was? "Yeah …"
"Tell me why."
"Because … I can't remember anything about my life before then."
"Meet me tonight at the Starbucks three blocks east from here. I'll tell you everything." Without even pausing to say goodbye, the Mr. Masters and his wife turned around and swiftly walked away. Kenny and Cranky stared after them, watching the pair disappear into the bustling crowd of people, never taking their eyes off the couple until they had completely vanished from sight.
"So," Cranky was the first to speak after they were clearly gone, "tell me how you know those people, again."
Kenny shrugged. "Mr. Masters is just a guy who set up a bank account for me and deposits two thousand American dollars into it every month for me to use. That's how I've been living my life for as long as I can remember."
"For the past nine years," Cranky added.
"Yeah."
Cranky's eyes suddenly widened. "So you really don't remember … anything beyond that?"
"No."
"Then how do you know who I am?"
"I …" all Kenny could do was stand there and stutter. Why hadn't he thought of this before? Who was this guy, acting like they'd been friends for a lifetime, and Kenny couldn't even remember how they'd met?
""Hayaku kaere!" Mr. Takayama's voice called angrily from the kitchen.
"Fuck him," Kenny said. "Listen, I gotta get back to work."
"Alright then," Cranky said, giving a thumbs up. "I'll catch you later. We have a lot to catch up on."