Chapter Eighteen
Shuichi stared out the window of the hospital room, tracing the patterns of the raindrops that dripped down in front of his face. It had been only hours since he had woken up, with an enormous headache, and nineteen years of memories stuffed into his brain. He was deep in thought, considering the vast mess that he was in, and how exactly it had happened.
What exactly had transpired for him to end up where he had been, living somebody else's life, was beyond him. Shuichi supposed that he would probably never know exactly what happened, except that somebody with low intelligence may have made the biggest mistake of their life.
He was sick, physically and mentally, stranded in a country halfway across the world from home, and his boyfriend thought that he was dead. Had thought so for such a long time, that he might already have a new boyfriend…or girlfriend. Who knew with Yuki?
But then again…Shuichi knew that for all Yuki's harsh words, the man did love him; and it worried him the effect that his "death" might have on the writer, whose fragile psyche had been trouble since the Kitazawa incident. Would he have gone into depression? Or maybe he would have blocked it out altogether, used it in one of his novels for a catchy theme? The only thing Shuichi did know was that somehow he had to find Yuki as soon as possible, and set the record straight. Unfortunately, he had no way to contact the man at the moment, as a phone call didn't seem appropriate.
It occurred to him that he could phone someone in Japan, not Eiri, but someone who knew where he was, so Shuichi could find him and talk to him face to face. It seemed more appropriate than a phone call.
And so, about thirty minutes later, after half explaining to Dr. James what he wanted to do, and promising the disgruntled man that he would hear the entire story, as the doctor still was in the dark about his newfound identity, Shuichi was nervously listening to the phone ringing.
"Mizuki here."
"Hi, um, I was wondering if you could tell me where Eiri Yuki is right now." There was a long pause.
"How did you get this number?"
"Um, Eiri gave it to me…"
"Nice try, Eiri only gives this number to people really close to him. And if you were close to him, you'd know that he's in New Y—" There was a muffled thump, followed by a long string of curses that made Shuichi hold the phone away from his ears.
"Um, well, you didn't hear anything from me. Goodbye."
"Wait!"
"…what?"
"Where in New York?" Shuichi heard the editor sigh impatiently.
"Okay, seriously, who is this? I don't have time to deal with this right now." Shuichi debated telling her, but realizing that there was no way she would believe him, he decided to lie.
"It's his boyfriend." Okay, maybe it wasn't a full lie…but Shuichi hated lying, so it was that much better.
"Liar. If Eiri had a boyfriend, I would know about it. Besides, he hasn't been seeing anyone since…Shuichi." Said boy felt his throat clench up with emotion.
"Are you…is this true?"
"What? You won't even tell me who you are, and you're accusing me of lying? I'm leaving. Goodbye, whoever you are, and I hope that Eiri gets home before meeting a deranged being like yourself." Click.
Well, that was a lot more informative than Mizuki had most likely realized. Plus, Shuichi could now re-examine the incident at the hospital, in which he had been locked in a closet, and bastard who sounded suspiciously like Eiri had completely not rescued him. It just had to be Eiri. Despite the fact that the chances were more than one in a million, it had to be him. Shuichi would recognize that voice…and attitude, anywhere.
Putting the phone down in the receiver, Shuichi felt momentary guilt and the ridiculous amount of money that he had probably sent phoning Japan, but put it from his mind. He needed to pay the doctor another visit, and maybe after all the favours he could pay the nice man back.
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It actually took longer than he expected, convincing the doctor to go downstairs, and, in a long, hard process, finally find some connection to Eiri. The ever suffering Dr. James, after describing Eiri's appearance to about every nurse that had been on the night shift, he finally found one lady who remembered him, and who he was with. It was only luck that the patient he was visiting was still in the hospital, but that was where the fortune ended. The lady informed them that although this "Eiri" had been visiting, the contact information for the patient, should there be any change in progress, was listed under a girl's name.
Shuichi didn't lose hope. Finally, after a long, complicated lie about being related to the patient in the hospital (who thankfully was asleep) and being backed up by a reluctant head doctor, the boy got the address of the girl's apartment. The only course of action was to pay this contact girl a visit, ask her a little about Eiri (if it even was him) and hopefully find out his boyfriend's address too. He didn't know how much longer he could wait before seeing his Yuki again!
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Shuichi stood in the staircase, outside the door to Annie's floor, peering through the tiny window down the hallway, excitement mounting inside. His chest rose and fell rapidly as he realized the enormity of the situation: Eiri thought that he was dead, but for some reason was still in New York, and soon, he was going to get the surprise of his lifetime…
As he grew more and more anxious, Shuichi began to wonder what Eiri's reaction was going to be. The whole situation was just so…unreal; it was like something you might read about in one of Eiri's romance novels.
The expression on the writer's face was going to be…priceless. First, Shuichi imagined confusion, then disbelief, confusion again, acceptance, and finally even love. The very thing that he'd been craving for so long, that had always been there, just constantly out of his reach. But now…now he was finally going to be able to soak it in. He hoped that Eiri would run over as fast as possible, lean down and gently stroke Shuichi's cheek, and tell him, with tears in his eyes, just how much the boy meant to him, and then—
The sounds of a quiet conversation broke their way into his imaginings. Shuichi looked up to see the man that had been haunting his waking and sleeping mind walking down the hallway beside another girl.
Eiri still hadn't seen him; he was too busy listening to something the girl was saying, a faint smile playing on his lips. It seemed like an eternity, during which time Shuichi's heart had frozen, until the girl stopped and began opening what appeared to be her apartment. Then, the two parted with no more than a friendly wave.
Shuichi relaxed happily against the wall, and then slowly opened the door to go meet Eiri. All that mattered to him was that any second, Eiri would raise his head, and see him standing there, waiting for him and—
"Excuse me, can I help you?" Shuichi halted his daydream, only to find a pair of familiar hazel eyes staring down at him coolly. There was no trace of passion, love, or even recognition in them.
"Ei..Eiri?"
"Yes, what do you want?"
"It's me!" Shuichi bit his lip and looked down, holding back tears. This wasn't how it was supposed to go! "Don't you know who I am?"
Eiri shook his head impatiently. "No, I have no idea who you are. Why don't you tell me so I can get on with my life?"
"Don't you even recognize your own boyfriend? It's me, Shuichi!"
He watched the writer's face go from confusion, to realization, to…disgust? He barely had time to register this last emotion before Eiri roughly grabbed his arms and pushed him against the door.
"I don't know what kind of sick game you're playing kid…" Eiri leaned in for effect, harshly whispering in the boy's ear, "But don't ever fuck around with my Shuichi's name again, or I'll fucking kill you." With that, he flung the boy aside, and stalked into his room, slamming the door violently behind him.
Sprawled out on the floor, Shuichi stared at the shut down, mouth open in complete shock. As what had just happened registered, the boy burst into helpless tears. Why? Why had Eiri rejected him like that? The man had reacted completely oppositely than he was supposed to, but why? It didn't make any sense to the boy, and he took his frustration out on the walls, kicking and punching them from his position on the floor, tears streaming down his face.
"Um, excuse me, what're you doing? What did you say to Eiri?" Shuichi looked up to see the girl that Eiri had been talking to looking curiously down at him. Coming to his own conclusion, he wiped an arm across his face roughly and cleared his throat.
"Are you Annie?" The surprise was evident on her face, but she still nodded.
"Who are you?" Shuichi laughed bitterly, which only brought on a new round of tears. "I'd tell you, but you probably wouldn't believe me."
"Try me." Annie knelt down on the floor beside him, looking expectantly over to hear his story. It couldn't, she reasoned, be any stranger or more depressing than Eiri's.
"You know Eiri." He stated in simply, so she found no reason to answer. It sounded like the boy already knew what he was talking about.
"How well do you know him?"
Annie shrugged. "Well, I dunno. I've known him since…well, since around when he first moved in to the apartment, and he fixed the pipes in my kitchen."
"He…he what?" That sort of kindness didn't sound like his Eiri.
"Yeah, he saved my whole apartment from flooding…I guess we sorta became friends after that."
"Friends?" Shuichi mentally punished himself for sounding like such a parrot. God, couldn't he come up with anything original to say? There was one thing that he wanted to ask badly, but he was afraid of the answer. It would kill him if it was true…but he still had to know.
"Are you…you know…um…together?"
"God no!" Relaxing in relief, Shuichi allowed a big grin in her direction, but all he managed was a cryptic reply.
"That's nice."
"Right, well now, can I ask you who you are and how you know my name?" Shuichi winced. Unfortunately, with all his plotting, he hadn't come up with a safe answer to this question. Although he didn't want to tell her what he had done, it was even more important to him that he didn't lie to her. Especially if she was Eiri's friend.
"Well," he began, "It all started when I accidentally got locked in a supply closet…" the boy proceeded to tell Annie his slightly edited tale of hearing Eiri's voice, realizing it was him, asking the nurses after him, finding about the girl he'd been with, who was visiting a patient, and (here, Shuichi blushed and stammered his way through the story) how he'd lied to the nurse to get her name and address.
"I see," came Annie's cool answer. "And why exactly did you feel the urge to go through all that trouble, while in the process breaking a few laws, just to find Eiri? Don't think I didn't notice that you never answered my question. Who are you? How do you know Eiri?"
Instead of answering directly, "I guess you know about the accident, right? The plane crash?" Annie nodded her head.
"So you know about Shuichi…the boy who died in the plane crash? Eiri's brave, cute wonderful lover?" The look on Annie's face amused Shuichi greatly, and he continued with his tirade.
"The one that Yuki always took for granted, and yelled at, and made fun of? And—"
"And loved." Annie spoke now, interrupting the boy's rant with a disgruntled look on her face. "Don't forget that."
Shuichi felt the power of her words, and could tell that she believed them fiercely. The fight went out of his body, and he went limp against the wall. Smiling a twisted grin at her, he ran a hand slowly through his hair, taking a deep breath.
"Well…I'm him."
Annie felt her heart stop. This boy, standing in front of her, was bold enough to claim being Eiri's dead lover…her temper flared up quickly, but died down as she reasoned with herself. He had warned her, that she wouldn't believe him…and the boy did look so much like the picture she had seen of Shuichi that it was uncannily frightening. But the impossible was impossible, as she liked to say, so Annie wordlessly got to her feet, and started walking back to her room.
At the door, she paused to look back at the boy, who was still lying against the wall, now with the most wretched, pathetic look on his face.
"It's a convincing story kid…and you do look a lot like him…but give it up. You're only hurting Eiri, and he doesn't deserve this. Please, go home."
Shuichi watched, resigned as she let herself into the room, much more quietly than Yuki, but no less finally.
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Eiri moved away from the peephole, having listened to the entire conversation between Annie and that boy. The sounds of soft crying filtered through the door, and the writer knew that the boy was still right outside his door, with that mournful look on his face.
The author slumped against the door. Had the boy really thought that he would believe him? For god's sake…what would possess someone…? The worst thing was, for a second, Eiri had actually almost believed him. That sincere look on the boy's face was so familiar to him that it had practically done him in; now he was so shaken up that he couldn't stand.
Who was this boy who looked so much like his dead boyfriend? What was he trying to get? The thing that bothered Eiri the most was the fact that this boy had tracked him all the way down to this apartment, and knew intimate details of his life (meaning about Shuichi).
Shaking his head as if to clear the treacherous thoughts from his head, Eiri climbed to his feet and wandered over to the window. From there, he could only see a sliver of the sky, but still, it was comforting. He stretched his head to the side to see more.
It had been a wet day, in the car on the way home, but the writer hadn't fully appreciated it then. What was it about that girl…? The writer fell down on the couch and thought about the ride home.
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Flashback
Eiri sat in the car, staring out at the droplets running down the glass, remembering how Shuichi used to sit at a window all day and watch the patterns; it was the only time that he wasn't so hyper. But at this memory, Eiri was proud to say that he didn't obsess over it as usual, instead, he smiled, and moved on with his thoughts.
Although she was driving (quite precariously, actually) Annie kept sneaking covert glances over at Eiri, to see how he was taking this. Not exactly the dullest knife in the drawer, he caught these looks, and was purposely ignoring her. Serves her right too, dragging him all the way out here…but then again, Eiri knew that it had been a momentous day in his recovery. Whatever…it was her turn to squirm.
He praised the genius god that had given her the solution to his problems. This feeling that he was having now…content, peacefulness, was something that he hadn't really experienced since the accident, and it was readily accepted back by him.
Annie began to chatter on and on, over the sound of the radio announcer's annoying English voice, talking about absolutely nothing. Normally, it would have irritated the hell out of him; being a man of few words, he didn't see the point in talking unless it was for a reason. Something that Shuichi and him had never really seen eye to eye on. But today, he was feeling lenient, and merely tuned out both external sounds.
It was time to phone Tohma. He couldn't spend any longer away from Japan; now that his excuse was bust, Eiri knew that his life was waiting for him at home.
Unfortunately, so was a long, awkward conversation with his father and sister. Maybe, if he brought Tatsuha, they could get through the whole thing together…after all, the whole scared-the-crap-outta-Tohma-with-a-pretend-suicide-and-accidently-dug-myself-into-a-deep-dark-grave-thing was partially his younger brother's fault too.
"Do you mind if I make a call?" Annie shook her head, so Eiri pulled out his cell phone and phoned Tohma's cell phone number. When the man answered the phone, Eiri felt a small prick of fear at telling him everything, but once he got into the story of what Annie had done (the slightly edited version) he found it was easier to talk. Finishing off, he informed his brother-in-law that he would be coming home soon.
Needless to say, Tohma was thrilled. He started going on and on about all the people who missed him and wanted to see him again, but seeing as Eiri really wasn't in the mood to listen he hung up and turned off his cell phone. The man knew he'd be paying later, but he didn't care. As long as he didn't have to listen to Tohma's crap now.
Sighing, he looked back out the window. As soon as he got home, he would start packing up his things.
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Sighing heavily once again at the memory of his decision, Eiri looked around the room. That encounter with the boy hadn't exactly put him in the packing mood. Instead, he got up and started rifling through his stuff. There was a big empty spot on the mantle, where the urn had used to sit. For some reason beyond him, Annie had insisted that it was buried near a tree. Having not exactly been in the arguing mood, Eiri had agreed.
Beside the space, the picture of Shuichi grinned up at him. On a whim, he picked it up and carried it over to the door, fully intending to compare that boy outside to the boy in the picture. But he was already gone.
Eiri shrugged his shoulders. It was for the best anyways.
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Author's Note: oh no! It's starting to seem like they'll never find each other! Especially after Eiri's reaction…I WAS going to have Eiri recognize him, and live happily ever after…but that wouldn't be very realistic now would it? Haha, just teasing…I've had this idea for a while…now the story can finally earn it's genre of ANGST! Muaha! Read and review!