THE CRY OF CICADAS

Chapter Five: Favorite Colors and Misa-Misa

Namikawa was officially my enemy. The "therapy" session was two hours of uncomfortable conversation. When his timer went off, I got up before he even told me to leave. He knew I did not like him. I knew he did not like me. At least we were on the same level. Our mutual hatred for one another made it obvious that one on one therapy sessions would get me nowhere. He had made it perfectly clear that he thought I was a hopeless cause.

That I was just like L.

I did not see any resemblance between L and myself. L truly was hopeless. He probably had more problems than I ever did or ever would. The thought that he and I were the same was completely wrong.

The clock in his office said that it was nine o'clock PM. Patients had to be back in their rooms by nine-thirty, so I figured I'd just go back…since I did not want to spend any more time with Namikawa or run into L again. Since turning myself in, I had not had a moment of privacy. I was beginning to feel like an animal on display, for people like Namikawa and Kiyomi to watch and evaluate.

I went out of the office and into the stark, white hallway.

L was standing right outside of the office, leaning against the wall. His hands were in his pockets and his head was hanging forward. "What do you think of Reiji?" he asked me, a friendly tone in his voice. I did not want to become friends with L. It would just prove that Namikawa was right.

"He's a pompous asshole," I said as I walked away from L. His bare feet smacked against the tile floor as he followed me. It was annoying to think that he had probably been waiting just outside the door the entire time I had been there. I did not understand why he seemed so fascinated with me…But for someone who had been there for a year, or possibly longer, what else was he supposed to do?

He came up next to me and narrowed his buggy eyes. "Reiji knows what he's doing," he said, "But he doesn't do a very good job of being amiable." Everything he was telling me was something I already gathered. Namikawa obviously was good at his job. He obviously was not friendly.

I shrugged. "I know that," I said, ready to get back to my room and away from L. Of course, Near would be there, waiting. He was almost the same as L. It seemed that I would never get away from these strange people.

L pursed his lips as he looked at me. The look on his face led me to believe he was measuring me up. "Raito-kun, the more rebellious you are, the longer you'll be here," he said, "Then my prediction will be proven correct." I knew in the back of my mind that he was right. The more I disrespected Namikawa, the more I did not do as people told me, the longer I would be stuck in this pseudo-prison.

He could think that he would be right all he wanted; I knew what I was doing and I knew I would be out of there within a manner of months. But instead of arguing any further, I just kept my mouth shut. Arguing with L was like arguing with a brick wall. What was left of my patience that day just could not handle it.

My silence aroused suspicion. "What's the matter?" L asked me, staring at me with his void-like eyes.

"Nothing."

The rest of the walk back to the room I shared with Near was done in an awkward silence. L stared at me the whole time, which I was not very surprised about, but something about his gaze made me feel strange. Not uneasy, but not comforted either. L was there and hardly there at the same time. Now, years later, I am still not sure what it was like to be around him.

Near was still awake when I returned. Luckily, by then, L had gone off on his own so I thought I would not have to put up with any sort of stupid questions about him. But as usual, my luck had turned rotten.

"Do you know L?" he asked me, looking up from the puzzle he had taken from the so-called "recreational" room. It was almost finished; a picture of some cliché landscape, complete with a cottage and a waterfall. The remaining tiny pieces lay scattered across the floor.

I shrugged and sat down on my bed. By then, I had had enough of questions. "Not really," I replied flatly. If the conversation ended there, I would be happy.

It was not going to.

Near put a few pieces together and sighed. "L's a nice guy but he lost in his game," he said ambiguously, his dark eyes flicking up from the puzzle to me. What he could possibly mean by "game," I had no idea. It was probably just some stupid phrase he had picked up from watching too much television as a kid. Strangely enough, his white, nondescript clothing reminded me of something a host of a low-budget game show might wear.

Now it was my turn to ask a question. "What do you mean?"

Once again, he sighed and picked up the puzzle, dumping it out on the floor. All that work, for nothing. "L was supposed to be here for two months," he replied, "But when he got out he used again and this time he lost. So he's stuck here until his family can arrange for a place for him to stay where people won't know who he is." As he spoke, he began putting the puzzle back together, barely taking any time to even look at the pieces. He seemed to have them memorized.

But his words took me by surprise. Two months had turned into a year…and now it might even become an even longer span of time. Whatever L had done had obviously messed him up more than I had originally suspected. I did not understand what Near meant by "a place where people won't know who he is," either. While I did not know L's real name, why would it be important for people not to recognize him? That would defeat the purpose of him trying to recover. If no one knew who he was, there would be no way he could receive any sort of help.

When I went to ask what he meant, Near shook his head and immediately announced he was going to bed. As he turned off the light, he said I would find out more later, if I really was so interested in L. According to him, everyone was.

The next morning, I was directed to the clinic wing of the center. As soon as I arrived, I realized what I would have to do. In rehabilitation centers, even the kind where the patients lived in them, they still had to undergo weekly drug tests. Needles were not things I was overly fond of but I supposed I would suck it up and deal with it. I kept telling myself that in a few months, this would all be over.

Unless I did end up like L.

That thought crossed my mind right as the nurse inserted the needle into my arm. I tensed, concentrating more on my thoughts than the fact that she was draining my blood, but she immediately took it that I was nervous. "I woulda thought that a druggie'd be used to needles," she said, her sad attempt at a joke.

I laughed without any humor. "Not all drugs involve injection," I told her, as if she did not already know. I felt the needle pull out of my vein, all the while imagining what it would be like to put up with that every week or possibly every day, in some people's cases, for a year. Someone like L, who had been there once, left, and back again probably had to go every day.

Once she'd stuck a band aid over the little puncture wound, she told me to head over to a group therapy session I had apparently been assigned to. I tried not to look too thrilled. Individual therapy was bad enough…going through it with other patients would be even more annoying. I was not a very understanding person and did not like to relate to others, whether we were alike or not.

The group therapy was in a small room near the office where I had met Namikawa the previous day. Unlike the office, this room had a more welcoming atmosphere. The chairs were arranged in circles. There was only one left for me. It did not take me long to notice that L was among the patients in the group. He did not acknowledge me though. To his right, sat Near, twisting his platinum hair around his fingers. Among the others in the group was a tall, dark haired young man with a grief-stricken expression on his face, a lanky, heroin addict (the veins swelling on his arms made it obvious), and a short, blonde haired girl.

The girl had a name tag on. It read "Misa-Misa" in big, swirly characters. No one else had them. She smiled up at me and tossed her hair over her shoulder. "Raito-kun, hello!" she beamed and motioned toward the empty seat, "Sit down, sit down!" I sat down, in between the heroin addict and the dark haired man.

Everyone in the group had their eyes on me. I stayed quiet and laced my fingers together, hardly wanting to be the center of attention. They seemed to be expecting something from me. "Hello," I said, for lack of anything better to say. That satisfied them, luckily. They averted their eyes, looking at each other instead of me. It was like they were sending each other messages about what they thought of me.

"Welcome, Raito-kun," Misa said and immediately resumed what their discussion, "So, we were talking about colors we liked, right? Favorite colors mean a lot about people…Raito-kun, why don't you tell us what color you like?" It was such a simple, yet pointless question…and Misa seemed to take it pretty seriously. For someone like her, I supposed things like that were important. No one else in the group seemed to care.

Colors were not things I tended to think about. But the spotlight had been shot back on me. "Black, I suppose," I said. It was a nondescript color, I figured. Although in most cases, black tended to represent feelings of depression or death. Misa would probably latch onto that.

She did.

"What do you think black says about you, Raito-kun?" she asked, practically ignoring the other young men in the group. The blond heroin addict was giving her an impatient glare, his foot tapping faster than I'd ever seen a foot move. Meanwhile, L was staring at me with more interest than Misa or Namikawa combined. Near and the dark haired man were preoccupied with other things.

I shrugged. "Nothing," I said honestly, "It was just the first color I thought of." I was beginning to wonder what the point of this was. At least with Namikawa, things seemed to be going somewhere. But here, in this primary school conversation, nothing was progressing.

"You should be more enthusiastic," L stated.

I gritted my teeth.

God damn him.

(Author's Note: Next chapter, more group therapy! Guess who the other two guys are. One should be pretty obvious! More will be revealed about L in the next chapter too! Stay tuned!)