End of Innocence v2.0

By Dixxy

Chapter Ten: A New Home

"Uh-uh!"

I groaned. "Give me a second, please, Ariel?"

"Uh-uh!"

"Ariel. . ."

"Uh-uh!"

I sat up, a tired but gentle smile on my face. Ariel was sitting up in her playpen, a plastic block in one hand and a stuffed hamster in the other. Her arms were wildly waving up and down as she used what little vocabulary she had (which was, at the time, confined to little more than grunts, screams, and cries – she wasn't quite talking yet) to get my attention. Once I reached the playpen I reached in and picked her up. "Hello there, little one."

"Uh-uh!" she cooed happily, dropping the toys on either side of us. She looked down at the hamster and began to whimper. "Uh-uh!" I nodded, bending down to retrieve the toy. Ariel cried out happily, holding the toy in front of her like a new treasure. I kissed her forehead and she giggled.

Holding her with one arm, I sat back down at the kitchen table to try and finish my homework – assuming Ariel would let me. I placed her on my knee, started to bounce said knee while keeping an arm around her waist, and picked up my pen again to finish up the science write-up I was working on. Ariel was delighted with the bouncing motion and clapped her hands in approval as she squealed in delight. I cracked a grin as I listened to her.

It had already been over a year since Ariel had been born, and about a year, give or take a few weeks, since Kojiro and I had gotten our apartment. We had enrolled in school and, as we expected, weren't exactly accepted right off the start because we were two boys trying to raise a little girl. People thought we were gay lovers, which we aren't, and it wasn't unusual to find our lockers or backpacks with words like "Fag" or "Queer" written or painted all over them. It was humiliating, and we were afraid to look to each other for support in public for fear of more harassment. We spent a lot of nights at our apartment just sitting on the couch, Ariel between us, sulking and talking about our problems as we tried to find solace in each other.

As I sat with Ariel at the kitchen table, however, Kojiro had already graduated from high school. He was attending night school three nights a week to earn a degree in computer graphic design ("I'll save the day-care for my mid-life crisis," he often joked), but for the mean time he was working in some office job that didn't require a college degree. Between the two of us he was bringing in more money and often had to help me pay for my own and Ariel's expenses. Bless him for doing that.

I was fighting my way through senior year. Kojiro had advised me on courses to take so I could land a job similar to his. From there I wasn't sure – I knew I wanted to go to night school like Kojiro to get a degree, but I didn't know what I wanted to do OR who would watch Ariel if we were both in college. If I hadn't been a parent then I wouldn't have questioned going into a career in marine biology, but I didn't think that would be an appropriate job to go after considering my situation. Field work could last days or even months at a time and I didn't want Kojiro to be stuck with her alone for long stretches of time, assuming he was with me that long.

Money was always an issue. Even with help from scholarships, student loans, and other things, we still found ourselves struggling to make ends meet. Whenever we DID have anything left over, we stuffed it into a bank account for an emergency. Kojiro had medical insurance with his job, but it didn't cover me and Ariel. Hopefully I could get coverage the following year once I was out of high school and working a better job. Still, I had Ariel to worry about. I'd have to find a company with employee daycare – much like the child care that the school offered – and hope that it was a good place to leave my child.

Parenting sucks, I thought on more than one occasion. I love Ariel with all my heart, but some days it's nearly impossible to bear. I'm had so many scares, sleepless nights and even a near nervous breakdown from all the stress. Doctors and teachers were telling me left and right to give Ariel up, but I put my foot down on that one. No matter how Ariel came into my life or how stressful it was becoming, I was going to BE a part of her life. I'd die before I let someone take my baby away.

Parenting and homework, two things I never thought I'd have to do at the same time, save helping my own children with their homework. But I had thought that would be years away only two years earlier. Yet here it was, sitting on my lap, probably thinking about her next snack, her next nap, or, her all time favorite, making me a special "present" in her diaper.

It was a Friday afternoon. Kojiro wasn't back from his job just yet, leaving just me and Ariel, though I didn't mind. It's nice to have Ariel to myself once in a while as long as she wasn't out of control. On those days Kojiro couldn't get home fast enough. But most of the time Ariel was a good baby – she was easy to amuse and relatively quiet if I needed some time to read or do my homework. Of course my paternal instinct didn't stop me from looking up every five minutes to make sure she was still in her playpen, moving and smacking her few toys together. If something ever happened to her because I didn't watch her close enough. . . I don't know WHAT I would do with myself.

"Hello, my little friends!"

I smiled weakly as Kojiro walked in, loosening his tie and dropping his briefcase into a chair. He yawned, stretched his arms over his head, and plopped down in the other kitchen chair. He looked tired, but not so tired that he was ready to sleep until the next morning (something he actually did once). He had a cup of coffee in one hand, which he was slowly nursing. "Long day at the office, Kojiro?" I asked. I put down my homework to give my friend a little attention while the other was focused on Ariel.

"Eh. It was okay. Same old, same old," he said. "Working tonight?"

"Yes," I said. I groaned. "I hate working on Friday nights. It's so busy."

"That's because people can stay out late because they don't work on Saturday morning. It's the kickoff to the weekend, Cye. You know that. You knew that long before you even came to Japan, never mind started working at the restaurant," said Kojiro. "So the squirt and I shall remain here while you're off feeding the masses."

"Hopefully I won't get any more unwanted advances," I said. I sighed and put my pencil down. The homework could wait until tomorrow at this point. I'd wanted to spend most of the day with Ariel to just play with her, but Kojiro had a point – I had to get ready for work. "Dear God, some Japanese women disgust me. They like to hit on anything that isn't Japanese, but you and I know they don't take any men but Japanese men seriously. Especially the old women."

"I hear ya," he said. "Sage had the same problem, didn't he?"

"He had it worse. I'm just average amongst Caucasian men. Women think God sent them Sage as a reward for. . . something. I don't know WHAT, but they think he's their gift to them. Sage would much rather hide than deal with it all," I said. I snorted. It was no secret that Sage was a very good-looking young man – Mia said we were all good looking, but even she said that there was something about Halo that made her heart flutter. This was a gift that he could have lived without, however. "Poor sap. You remember that incident where that one girl chased him down the street, right?"

"Oh yeah!" Kojiro said. He cleared his throat, batted his eyes, and began to talk in a high pitched girlie voice. "But Sage darling! Let me bear your children! I want to make sweet love to you all night long, my hot honey dew of lovin'! Take me, I'm ALL YOURS! OH, SAGE, YOU HANDSOME DEVIL, YOU! DO ME LIKE THERE'S NO TOMORROW! OH, OH, OOOOHHHHH!" By this point he was lying on the couch, the back of his hand to his forehead and his eyes gazing upwards.

I shook my head at him. "You're awful."

"And yet you keep me around," he said, sitting up.

I stood up. Kojiro followed suit to take Ariel. She looked at him curiously, tugged at his hair, and laughed happily as he cried out from the pain. "I'm so glad she likes you, Kojiro. I don't know what I'd do if she didn't, you know. It's just so nice to know I have someone I can trust her with."

"If I go bald before twenty YOU'RE paying for my hair replacement therapy."

"I'm sure I will."

Kojiro stuck his tongue out at me. I returned the gesture.

I returned home well after midnight in my usual post-work condition. After being on my feet all night, running between the kitchen and the dining hall, every part of my body seemed to my hurting. My wrists hurt horribly from carrying trays and writing down orders, my back hurt from carrying all of that food and I was about convinced that my legs would stop working all together one of those days. In addition, I also had a little added pain from a dropped coffee that splashed on my arm and a cut hand from a glass that someone had broken. I also smelled like teriyaki and wasabi sauce from just being in the restaurant all night.

Groggily, I removed my shoes and collapsed onto the pitiful excuse for an easy chair in the living room/dining room once I made sure the door was closed. I sat there for several minutes, not wanting to move a muscle. I'd been doing nothing BUT move for the past several hours and I had had enough of that.

Exhaustion was something I'd come to know very well now that I was a parent. I spent many nights with a finicky Ariel who wouldn't sleep due to illness, or gas, or a diaper change, or even nights she just didn't want to go to sleep. Kojiro still offered to take her, but most of the time I wouldn't let him. There really was no reason for him to have to do that, after all. She was my baby, making her my responsibility. Besides, he needed sleep, too.

But Ariel wasn't the only problem. I was constantly working if I wasn't in school, and I rarely had a day-off. I averaged four hours of sleep a night and at times declared the coffee pot in our kitchen was my only friend in the world (Kojiro didn't usually object to this – he often declared the coffee part a sacred relic). Breaks from school were used for sleeping while classmates were going on day trips to the mall or video arcade. My teachers and fellow classmates knew I was sleep deprived, and it wasn't until I fell asleep while standing on the chalk board and hit my head against the ledge of the board as my body fell to the floor. All I remember from that day was waking up in the nurses' office with Kojiro panicking across the room asking if I had a concussion.

Eventually I was able to force myself out of the chair – I had to get to bed. Sleeping in the chair all night would do me no good. Though my bed was no luxurious scientifically enhanced relaxation system, it was still comfortable enough for me to get a good nights sleep. Leaning against a wall for support from both a stiff back and lack of energy, I stumbled towards Ariel's nursery.

Considering our very tight budget, the nursery did look fairly extravagant. Though I couldn't afford anything fancy to begin with, well, having an artist for a roommate has its advantages. Kojiro offered (read: begged and pleaded for three days) to paint Ariel's nursery. After I accepted the offer (read: gave in due to lack of sleep from Kojiro repeating the word "please" directly into my ear for two hours straight while I was trying to sleep), he went straight to work.

I wasn't sure how he planned to pull it off – after all, where was he going to get the money for all that paint? As it would turn out he spent less than ten dollars on paint – one of the art teachers was getting rid of paint at the end of the school year and, seeing an opportunity, relieved her of most of it. I had to admit – I was impressed, but still skeptical. Kojiro just gave me a smirk as he set about his work.

The crib, dresser, changing table, lamp, and diaper pail we'd gotten had all been plain and in some cases second-hand. Kojiro fixed those immediately with a coat of pale pink paint and purple polka dots. I liked those, and they did add to the room, but Kojiro wasn't satisfied. He was starved for a big art project after all the business courses he'd been taking and suddenly took on the look of a playboy at a single's dance as he started on the walls.

Each of the four walls sported a different mural, and each one he was very proud of. One of them was a meadow with a purple unicorn standing on its hint legs, the horn shinning in the bright sun he's painted in the corner. The next wall featured a fairy ballerina (we nicknamed her "Betty") standing on one toe with curtains and an audience behind her. He also had a wall that listed all of the letters in the English alphabet, each in a different script and color, as well as all of the numbers from one to ten. The last wall, my personal favorite, was an underwater scene with fish, coral, and a blue haired mermaid (we called her "Wilma").

Ariel was asleep. I went over to her crib, reached down to stroke her cheek, and smiled. Going into her room after work was something I did as often as I could. Now a days Kojiro put her down for the night. I wanted to see if she was awake for some odd reason so I could give her my love in person. Disappointed but still satisfied in at least seeing her, I headed off to my own room.

Our bedroom ("we" being myself and Kojiro) is simple and not much more ornate than what we had at the shelter. We each had a half of the room, mine considerably plainer than his. My walls are almost entirely bare, save a hand-print Kojiro had helped Ariel make a few weeks earlier onto a piece of construction paper and some photographs we had of her. I also had a small bookshelf with books on topics ranging from pleasure books (though you wouldn't know it, I'm addicted to Stephen King) to small collections of books on surviving horrible ordeals and even a few parenting books. Then there's my bed, a small dresser, and a laundry hamper.

Kojiro's side is lined with some cheap sketch books and a few paintings he'd done for school. The paintings varied quite a bit in style – there was one picture of an elderly couple he'd seen in the park one day, a dragon, and a few landscapes amongst others. He says one of his personal favorites was one of me he'd painted while I was sleeping on the couch one day.

That piece wasn't out – he kept it in the back of his closet. "It's not that I don't like the painting, Cye, but it creeps me out sometimes," he said. "You looked so peaceful while I was painting you until you got that pained look in your face and you started to try and throw her off of you in your sleep."

Though Kojiro was my biggest support whenever I needed help, it was no secret the rape was having a toll on him as well. Although he will never know what I went through and I hope he never does, he's involved. He's been by my side ever since it happened and only left it when his family fell apart. Outside of his job, school, and painting, he spent almost all of his left-over energy on making sure I was okay – he felt like he couldn't do anything for me and it was hurting him as well.

I know it sounds odd, but it's true. These kinds of things rarely just affect the victim – victims have friends and family who care about them and their well-being. When they find out what's happened, they get hurt, too. Why shouldn't he wish there was something he could've done to stop it? Something that could have saved me from Sheila's cold and unwanted hands? I always tell him there was nothing he could have done, and I know I'm right. How could he have known what kind of person she was? And what kind of person I was? Had someone else been with Sheila that night most of them would have had their underwear around their ankles in a second. Still, Kojiro feels there was some sort of warning sign that he missed. A predatory glance, an unwanted brush of the hand, maybe even a time he could've walked in on the two of us arguing. I know he agonizes about it inside. It bothers him, and he deals with it by talking with me.

I looked across the room to where Kojiro was sleeping. He was lying flat on his back, mouth wide-open as he snored loudly and mumbled something about spaghetti sauce in his ice cream. I shook my head and chuckled to myself – poor Kojiro. If only that were the extent of his problems, instead of dealing with me.

As I grabbed some pajamas to change into, I stared across the room at Kojiro with sad eyes. He really was a good friend. I smiled. He was dreaming about a giant ice cream sundae (or at least I'm assuming that's what it was considering the context of his sleep talking) and seemed happy as he rolled over. "Nuh uh. . . my chocko syrup. . . s'mine, I tell ya. . . go way. . . s'mine. . ." I shook my head as I headed into the bathroom.