Since such a big group of people happened to swell the house more than usually even sans parents, it was decided that Yuu and find some ingredients for okonomiyaki, a Japanese dish that roughly translates to "as you like it". Essentially a flour-and-egg pancake topped with ingredients of the diner's own choosing, Meiko stirred up the batter while Yuu began to chop up the ingredients, which included chives, ham, pepperonis, shrimp, tuna, and peppers.
During the cooking, Jay had gotten into a conversation with Satoshi on the differences between American comics like Spider-Man and Green Latern, and manga series like Dragon Ball and One Piece. The volume of comics that Japan put out made it sound too good to be true, especially if they were full of drawings of suppliant naked chicks that Satoshi made them out to be. Trying to hash out all of the differences for a good hour and getting stuffed with okinomiyaki made Jay want to take a break. He went upstairs trying to find a window to blow out his smoke during his pause. Jay found Miki bent over the window in Yuu and Bill's room looking at the same skyline that Yuu had been looking at while she was back home, the palms of her hands holding up her head. She wished that her own cooking skills could approach those of Yuu's, even though his weren't necessarily stupendous. The thought made her heave a huge sigh. She wondered how often he thought of her as her eyes traced the buildings and ports of this city. Before Jay could admire her cute rear end much longer, Miki felt a presence in the room and turned around, finding the American more clownish than Michael before her. Luckily her English skills had improved a bit by being around Michael, so she was able to ask him what he might have wanted.
"Even I need some time to chill and pause," he said, wondering why she was still in front of the window when he needed the open space to take a smoke. He figured that maybe this girl would move out of the way some if he could inch closer to the window with some small talk. "So how come this guy's named 'Yuu'? Sounds like his mom couldn't think of what to call him," he said, moving closer to her right side so that she'd clear a path. Miki, thinking that Americans simply made conversation with less surrounding personal space, didn't budge an inch. Still, she knew from Michael the close similarities between "Yuu" and "You" to laugh a little.
"In Japan, we use the words 'anata', 'kimi', or 'omai', depending on the surrounding feelings of the people," Miki explained. "When Yuu teases me, I call him 'omai', but in the other cases, I think of him in the 'anata' way." She smiled to herself. "Very much so now."
"So you're into him?" Jay asked, realizing that Miki wasn't going to really move out of his way. He took a seat on Bill's bed, leaning his back to the wall with his hands on the sides of his thighs, the soles of his sneakers propped up in plain view. "Flying all the way out here to meet him from Japan? You might as well get married while you're at it."
Miki blushed at the thought of her and Yuu getting married, but then looked down. "We almost couldn't. We thought we were brother and sister for a while there," she said. Jay couldn't help but be startled, remembering his dream from the bus ride earlier that day, and the romance novel from even earlier. It sounded like she had a story to tell; maybe she would get into some better details than what he picked up at the convenience store.
"The fuck? How?"
Miki sat down on Yuu's bed and began to tell Jay all of the sordid details of her and Yuu's epic ordeal. Some of the time Miki had difficulty with describing what went on in English, so Jay corrected her as best as he could. He heard all about their parents swapping partners, Miki and Yuu falling in love, the on-again, off-again nature of their relationship, the rivalries with their would-be suitors, the angst of separation across the Pacific, her return to America and the dangers she faced after leaving Yuu when he revealed that they were related by blood. No sex, not much mischief, not even a fart joke – just one of the most compelling true stories that Jay had ever heard from someone else.
Miki felt a little bit of relief from telling her story, even if it was in somewhat broken English to who amounted to a clownish American stranger. Still, she felt overwhelmed by it all to shed a couple of tears. "I am sorry, we have had a troubling experience. But it is okay if I cry since it is America and persons are more free to do that?" she said in an asking sort of tone.
It was becoming too much of an emotional roller coaster for Jay to handle. He had to change the mood, and he knew just how to do it quickly.
"In America, we're free to do this too. At least while the fuzz aren't looking." He got off the bed, kneeled next to one of the nightstands and took out a thin piece of paper and a bag of what Miki took to be oregano. Jay lay the piece of paper flat on the nightstand, and then started to put some of the oregano on it, enough to where he started rolling up the paper to produce a small bulging cylinder with very thin ends. Miki had no idea what Jay was up to until his arms were hanging out of the window with the oregano-filled paper. He got out a lighter from one of the pockets of his large coat, and put a flame to one of the thin ends. Then he…put the non-burning end in his mouth?
"Why do you smoke oregano?" Miki asked.
Jay looked at her and smiled, but tried not to laugh at her cluelessness. "This is why I came today. Brian was going to buy this marijuana from me today, but the pussy shit hasn't got me my cash yet. I need some hits, 'cause it's been a shitlong day."
Miki was already averse to cigarettes and really disliked the thought of any of her friends smoking. But when she heard the term "marijuana", her eyes widened and she began to freak out. "B-b-b-but you cannot be smoking that! It is dangerous and can make you do criminal things! The police will give you trouble if you have it!"
"This? Yeah, if you're stupid and you're doing it out in the open. How many people do you see out and about now?" Jay pointed out. Miki went to the window to see a couple of students, but not many people out during this time of night. While her face was out scoping the vicinity, she smelled a pleasant fragrance just like when Chiyako had put oregano on a baked chicken before putting it in the oven. Oh no, I actually smelled it, she thought to herself. She had to get out of here lest everyone else thinks that she was a marijuana addict! She turned around, and then found Yuu in the doorway, taking a break from cutting up the okinomiyaki ingredients. She paused in fear; how was she going to explain herself being alone with Jay, and with him smoking the marijuana!
Yuu started to sniff the air, realizing immediately what that was. He walked towards Miki with his characteristically expressionless face, but rather than castigating her, he kept walking towards where Jay was smoking. Was he going to tell Jay to put it out, or kick Jay out?
"Yo, don't be bogarting all of the stash," Yuu said as he stood beside him. Miki had no idea what sort of American colloquialism Yuu was using, but she was trying to decide what was more odd and unsettling as Jay started to hand Yuu that marijuana cigarette. That Yuu was himself smoking it, or that he had shared what amounted to an indirect kiss with Jay by putting his lips where Jay's had been.
Miki said something in Japanese to Yuu in an excitable way and ran up next to him, making the space at the window a bit crowded. "What the hell are you doing, Yuu! You don't smoke! And you're smoking the marijuana plant of all things! The health teacher told us that it's very wrong and dangerous to smoke this, so why are you doing it? And you're sharing the same cigarette as that clownish Jay, so it's like you're kissing him!" she yelled at him in Japanese.
Yuu inhaled a bit, and as Miki was castigating him, Yuu held in the smoke for about five seconds before exhaling it into the New York air. "Miki, they exaggerated about marijuana in those classes. It's not healthy, so I haven't been smoking it that much. But sometimes it's good, I've found while I've been here," he replied in their native tongue. Miki was about the smack the phatty out of Yuu's mouth, but Jay gave her a very menacing glare as Yuu stood between them enjoying the hooka. Still weary from the near-rape that she experienced with that gang of Americans from last night, she didn't want to see what this American was capable of, so she backed down.
"But won't you get addicted to it? What made you decide to start smoking that stuff? Only bad people are supposed to smoke it," Miki countered, but only to Yuu's laughter.
When he finished laughing, Yuu explained, "A lot of that is propaganda. At first I was suspicious when Brian first handed me some in his pipe, but he told me that it relaxes the body, and that it wasn't addictive like cigarettes. Since I had finished a hard test earlier that day, and I knew that more of my new friends had also tried it without any ill effects, so I thought that I would try it at least once. I found that it's a good thing to do once in a while when you've had a tough day." He took another hit as Miki looked on, and then passed the blunt back to Jay.
Stoners often liked to initiate their craft to someone who had never had tasted the aroma of a phatty, and Jay was no exception. He leaned over Yuu and put it at Miki's face. "C'mon, you need it more than I do from all that crazy shit you were telling me," Jay said. Miki stood aghast, but then looked at Yuu giving her one of his quiet and charming smiles, and then nodding slightly. Yuu took the blunt from Jay, took out a pair of scissors from the nightstand, and cut off the piece that had his and Jay's spit. Yuu then put it back in his mouth, took in a drag, and exhaled. He handed it to Miki. "I can't let anyone kiss you but me," he said calmly.
Miki smiled and took it between her forefinger and middle finger, and then tried to smoke it like she saw celebrities smoke cigarettes in the movies. After inhaling deeply, not only did she start to go into a coughing fit, but also dropped the hooka on the floor when she felt the strange warmth of it as if it were going to burn her hand. As Yuu laughed, Jay picked up his weed from the floor and then tried to wipe away any dirt that might have accumulated on the paper.
"You see, Yuu, I can't smoke that. Now you see why it's dangerous!" Yuu got the cigarette from Jay's fingers to give Miki a lesson.
"You have to hold it like this," Yuu demonstrated as he held the grass between his thumb and his forefinger and middle finger squeezed together. "And you have to breathe in normally, and keep the smoke in for a few seconds as if you're feeling the aroma. Then you exhale, gently, and enjoy the relaxing sensation for a few moments." Yuu did as he said, and Miki couldn't help but notice how peaceful and at-ease Yuu's countenance looked as he was giving his lesson. After he exhaled, Yuu handed the blunt to Miki, who then tried to copy Yuu's actions.
As she held the weed in her fingers the way Yuu showed her, she smelled some of the smoke coming from the other end. She had to admit that it was pleasant-smelling, and did want to actually do it right this time rather than go through the motions. She put her lips back on where Yuu's lips had been, and then time tried to breathe much more gently, more to avoid another coughing fit than to appreciate the fragrance. She held it inside her for about three seconds before exhaling it out, coughing a little bit, but not nearly as much as when she took her first hit.
"You did okay, Miki. But in order to feel the effects, you have to keep doing that a few times," Yuu explained as he handed the cigarette back to Jay. Miki found that she really didn't mind the smoke anymore, and then asked Jay to roll up one just for herself and Yuu. He did so, handing a fresh phatty and a lighter to Yuu. "First one's always free, kiddies. Smoochie-boochies!"
As Yuu and Miki shared the smoke together, Miki started feeling unexpectedly light-headed. She wasn't dizzy, but the sensation of existing in the world around her shifted into a haze of disconnect. Her head swayed back and forth, and before she knew it she went into a fit of uncontrolled giggling. Yuu hadn't smoked this much before, and his own perceptions started to betray him into his own laughter at everything around him. Jay, much more hardened to the effects of the plant, simply rested his arm on the windowsill and enjoyed the show as he bogarted his own blunt.
Paying Jay no mind, and not even having the concentration to speak English, Miki put her arm around Yuu and clung to him, looking up at his now red-blotched eyes as she tried to keep her balance. "Hey Yuu, why the hell do you want to be an architect? All those buildings over there don't want to stay in the same place!"
"God, you're messed up! You're the one making the room go spinny. Wheeeee!" Yuu said in a dazed and sputtered way. He rose up, letting Miki fall to the floor and then spread his arms out, spinning around not unlike a 5-year-old pretending that he was an airplane while still holding the joint. Miki landed on her right arm on Yuu's bed. "Whoa…hey Yuu, why did you get a waterbed? Did you get one to make it with Ginny while I was gone?"
"That's not a waterbed, but you're still gonna go ahead and fuck that penguin anyway, aren't ya?" Yuu asked, laughing at the thought as he hallucinated a giant emperor penguin laying beside Miki on his bed. Miki, steadily rising with her knees and calves still on the bed, couldn't quite make out what Yuu was talking about. "Yeah, well I didn't wanna fuck my own sister earlier, so me and your penguin will be happy together."
Yuu staggered back towards his bed, still laughing. "Yeah, and you wanted to do your own brother too. So you're a penguin-fucker and a brother…a brother…wait, you're not black."
Miki snorted and pointed at Yuu. "And I'm messed up? You are so wasted! You better straighten up before I start to go out with this penguin." Miki curled up on her left side and then pretended to romance Yuu's imaginary penguin, hugging the air and kissing at it.
Yuu still imagined the penguin was there, and it was getting to cozy with his beloved. He handed Jay the joint and then stumbled onto the bed in the penguin's place. "The penguin can't love you like I can," Yuu said as he looked into Miki's own bloodshot eyes. He embraced Miki and started to kiss her. Her inhibitions tossed away with so much marijuana smoke, she rejoined his kisses. As Yuu started to slip his hands underneath the back of Miki's shirt, Jay saw that their playtime was starting to get good. He knew hat Brian had a camcorder stashed away in his room, so he quietly darted off to retrieve it, returning to find Miki in a pink frilly bra and Yuu shirtless. From a nondescript corner and with the help of the city lights in the distance coming through the open window, Jay videotaped their stoned attempts, and success, at lovemaking.
Miki and Yuu woke up the next morning, holding each other naked in their arms under the sheets. At first they were both quite embarrassed, but they knew that this was the way they wanted to greet each other each morning for the rest of their lives. They had wished that they could have remembered more of that night, but they left it as a sweet treasure to be remembered for their passionate coming together as a young couple in love.
Jay remembered it as a chance to cash in where Brian wouldn't pay up for his stash. Consequently, others remembered their night as the second scene in "Asian Amateurs 7: Haze of Glory", available at many fine adult video retail outlets.
The end!