The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons.
-By T. S. Eliot, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
Night has fallen when the bus screeched to a halt. Akihiko and Hiro gave their thanks to the driver before they hopped off, and the bus roared clumsily back on its route. The distant roar of the highway was dimly heard among the orchestra of cold insects as the two boys walked in the inner workings of the suburbs and in the area where their school dorms were. They walked through the glass doors of their own dorm, welcomed by the cheery, yellow ceiling lights and by the reckless chatter of their dorm mates. Hiro was pulled away by his friends' greetings, giving a brief "see you later, Senpai!" and Akihiko made headway up the stairs to his own room.
From the common room, the rec room, and the passersby in hallways and from the open doorways of other rooms, Akihiko's ears were bombarded with congratulations from his last match and by gasped laudations from awestruck underclassmen. He paid them no mind, wanting to just dump his stuff in his room, his quiet, private room, and head down to the cafeteria for dinner. He closed the door behind him, leaned his school bag against the desk and dumped his gym bag at the foot of his bed.
"Congrats on your match," said a voice from the top bunk bed.
Akihiko closed his eyes and sighed. "Thanks," he replied dejectedly.
Shinjiro looked over the edge of the bed down at his friend, who sat heavily on the lower bunk. He put aside his magazine and leaned his head over the edge.
"Well, aren't you a ray of sunshine. Usually you'd be smirking around the dorm like some prick after your team won a match, and that win was because of you."
Akihiko leaned back to rest his head against the wall, resting his eyes in the shade of the top bunk.
"…You're the second person in this whole day to ask about my win. Yeah, I guess I should be happy, but," he paused, frowning; "I just can't bring myself to feel, I don't know, zippy or something."
Shinjiro scowled at the word choice. "Zippy?"
"Hiro's word, not mine."
"Oh, that guy." Shinjiro leaned back on his pillow and unfolded his magazine to the article he had been reading. "He's got a huge yap on him. He's going to get slugged, one of these days, since he can't control that yap of his."
"He's an okay guy," shrugged Akihiko. "But I can see what you mean. He can get pretty confusing."
"His existence is a confusion," retorts Shinjiro playfully. "So…Care to share your thoughts?"
Akihiko laid down fully on his bed, his arm covering his eyes. "Since when are you my shrink?"
"Since I became your manager," replied Shinjiro. "Gotta look out for the well-being of my cash cow, I mean, my client. How would it look on me if your performance fails? I would deny ever knowing you."
Akihiko scoffed good-naturedly. "And when was the last time I failed? Never. And what do you mean by 'cash cow?' You're making money off me?"
"That is how I'm able to treat ramen at Hagakure with you," answered Shinjiro.
"And some manager you are! You never came to my matches ever since my third win of the school year. And the only time you sort of came was when I was up against that dirtbag Imadori from the next school district."
"That's because everyone knows that he beats up people on the streets, and that he cheats in his ring. It's a lot more interesting to see you get creamed than to watch you KO some amateur from another school."
"You and your street fights, Shinji. They don't mean much in the rules of boxing."
"And you're satisfied with that?"
Akihiko said nothing. Shinjiro sighed and rose from his bed. He climbed down the ladder and pulled on his boots.
"I already know what your problem is, Aki. You got all that strength and all you can do right now is knock down the small fries. Everyone knows that our school is the top contender in the upcoming finals and that we're expected to win. All because of you," he added. Shinjiro picked up his school coat that was hanging from his chair and shrugged it on. "You're even better than the school captain, so there's no one who stands equal to you. Except for me, that is. And the whole situation annoys the heck out of you."
Akihiko rose to a sitting position and sat on the edge of his bed.
"You could've joined the boxing team with me, Shinji," he pointed out. "Then we could both get stronger and build each other up as we go."
"No thanks. I do things my way, and my way doesn't involve fighting amateurs in pretend fights. Now come on. Let's go get ramen in Hagakure."
Akihiko got up and pulled on his coat. He grabbed his wallet from his school bag and headed out the door after Shinji.
"Yep. I'm stuck in a rut all right. I really need something to get out of it instead of just doing extra training at the gym."
Shinjiro held open the double glass doors for him and Akihiko and they both walked off in the cold winter night towards the nearby train station.
"Well, there's that city-wide championship to look forward to. And then high school; you'll be up against the big boys at last, Aki."
There was no need to ask questions in front of Shinjiro Aragaki. He made up his lack of involvement with other people with his astute observation of people's involvement with each other. His only known affiliation is his childhood friend Akihiko, whom being both orphans of roughly the same age when they were first inducted in the orphanage, may as well be brothers. He, Akihiko, and Akihiko's late sister Miki are family when no other family would take all three of them. And when the three siblings were reduced to two, the boys vowed on that cold, winter morning to be strong enough to not let anyone, not death, not authority, and not circumstances, to tear their status as a family apart.
The night was cold and the stars were in the sky. The city wasn't quite big enough to obscure the heavens with boisterous city lights. There were women who came and go, vaguely talking about the Michelangelo gallery that just came to an art museum, pedestrians of various sizes and coat colors crowded the train station and the roads were just finishing their minor rush hour back from the busy life of Iwatodai. Everything was straight-forward when Akihiko was with Shinjiro and life went back to simpler, organized standards.
Akihiko and Shinjiro talked and laughed about minor things, and the things that lurked inside Akihiko crawled in their cubby holes in a thin sleep, sometimes twitching, sometimes still moving.
It was a question that went unspoken that Akihiko didn't know, but felt it there and it wanted release. The type of question that supercedes the why's and when's to the top of the podium.
They walked through the turnstiles after depositing their tokens and bought their tickets. The train pulled up and, as they stepped inside, the question raised its head again.
It is the 'how' type of question that needs to be spoken and avoided.
"Here you go boys!"
Two steaming bowls of the house specials were placed on the counter and the boys eagerly snapped their chopsticks and dug in. Between slurps and sips of soup from the large spoon, Akihiko had another nagging feeling, like there was something else to be checked marked off the list.
"Oh yeah. I got that interview for Gekkoukan High School tomorrow," he remarked out loud.
Shinjiro stopped eating and drank his glass of water.
"Gekkoukan? You mean that fancy high school on Port Island? I hear that all the students there are a bunch of rich pricks."
Akihiko gave an admitting roll of the eyes. "Yeah… but I know that their boxing program is one of the best. I'm really hoping that maybe I'll get a scholarship there, or something."
"You and your boxing," Shinji shook his head. "Well Richie Rich, how the hell are you going to pay to go to a recently established private school which includes living expenses? Become a sell-out and fight in the streets for money? Maybe you could honey up with Kirijos to let them admit you into their school? Even with a scholarship, and maybe a part-time job, it's barely enough to cover all three years of tuition and board. Don't even think about the other expenses."
Akihiko shrugged. "Just trying to cover my bases. I have my sights set on other schools, but it would be great if I got into Gekkoukan. I want to reach the very best that this city has to offer."
Shinjiro then snickered. "You know, maybe you could get accepted if you butter up the interviewer a bit. Paint yourself as one of those Cinderella boxing stories of how this rising star was once living in underprivileged circumstances, and orphaned- you gotta mention that you're an orphan- and is now an honor student and an excellent athlete. Yeah, they'd eat up that shit."
Akihiko gave Shinjiro a playful shove. "Hey, knock it off, Shinji. I don't want people to pity me."
Shinjiro couldn't resist the jibe. "I pity the fool-"
Akihiko groaned. "Hey, quit it!"
"-who pities the great Akihiko Sanada. Hey, you forced me to watch the Rocky movies. I gotta get back at you for torturing me one of these days."
"The movies were great-"
"You made me buy you eggs, so that you can drink five of them in a glass," exclaimed Shinji, his lips curled in disgust, shaking his head. "Then, you went and got food poisoning and had to stay in the bathroom all day, skipping school. You made me copy down notes for you and tell everybody what the hell happened to you, which I explained in graphic detail. You're going to get yours one of these days."
"I know, I'm sorry. And I really appreciated what you did for me." Akihiko polished off his noodles and waited for Shinji to finish his. He felt the worries of the day melt away and felt for the moment that right now his life is okay and without a need for improvement. He sometimes felt that none of the other guys on the boxing team really know where Akihiko was coming from, as they all have families and a normal home. But, as he blinked to remind himself, he shouldn't try to force everyone to understand him. Sometimes it's fine just to be with friends without having to relate everything with them.
Shinjiro set down his bowl with a contented sigh and fished for money in his wallet. Akihiko did likewise and counted the bills to pay for their dinner. They received their checks, hopped down from the barstools, and sauntered out of the restaurant, their cheeks pinched in the sudden cold after staying in the gregarious warmth of the ramen restaurant.
Some fog had rolled in from the bay, making the air damp and obscuring the waxing gibbous moon; the lights from the city reflected from the water in the air, giving the sky a luminous, glowing look. The two boys stepped inside the train car, the fluorescent milking their skin and highlighting the hollows of their faces. They sat together on hard, the hard, flatly cushioned seats and slightly braced themselves against the small turns that jerked the car around.
Akihiko rested his head on the back of his seat, feeling slightly drained from the activities of the day and wondering what to expect on his interview with the representative from Gekkoukan. He closed his eyes and thought of his decisions. Soon those decisions became indecisions and the visions became revisions. There is time to think them all, so he went on thinking of his future where he knows his decision and which it would become his vision, and then… then the time would come when his efforts would be rewarded.
"Hey Aki, I just remembered something."
"What's up?"
Shinjiro sat up straight and reached inside his pockets, looking for something. "I got a letter from the headmistress of the orphanage."
"Really?" Akihiko sat straight in attention, intrigued. "What's it about?" This was their first year living in a dorm, part of gradually pulling away from the dependency of the orphanage staff, though still considered as their wards.
Shinjiro unfolded the letter, smoothing out the deep creases with his knee. "It's about when we're graduating from middle school. They want to hold a shindig for the kids graduating, like you and me." He gave Akihiko the letter, letting him examine the details in full. Shinjiro leaned back in contemplation.
"It's been a while since we were there," he remarked.
"Yeah…" trailed Akihiko, having finished reading the letter. "Remember Ms. Yomi? One of the caretakers? I kind of missed seeing her, since she's always got on our case whenever we played in the streets all day. Those were fun times."
"I heard she got hitched," replied Shinjiro. "I guess we'll have to call her by her married name if we get to see her. Well, I guess it's something to look forward to when we graduate, aside from high school."
Akihiko just got a nagging feeling just now, like a worm stirring in the back of his mind.
"Are you planning to attend high school, Shinji?" he asked, somewhat hesitantly.
"…Maybe."
Akihiko placed his arm on the back of his seat to face his friend fully. "What, you're thinking of just leaving school at middle school? Like going straight to the workforce?"
Shinjiro sighed. "Well, it's not like getting into a fancy schmancy private school is a feasible option for us. Even just a regular high school might be problematic… And we're not required to attend high school, so I'm thinking practically."
Akihiko looked away, stumped. He could see the reasoning, but found it hard to accept such an option. He knew that Shinjiro can reach far if he put extended effort into it, and to him high school was like the beginning of starting a life. It meant more opportunities to explore, obtaining better job options, maybe even open the door to college. And more personally, it's to see how much he'll develop as a person. It perturbs him to see someone just stop at where he is, not going forward anymore.
Shinjiro looked at Akihiko critically, taking in his slumped form and barely contained composure. He gave him a jesting nudge, startling Akihiko.
"Relax, pansy. I ain't going to stop now. Imagining you going at life all by yourself is a scary image. It'll be a hoot, but it's going to be annoying when things get tough and you come crying to me every time something doesn't go your way."
"Tch, whatever!" scoffed Akihiko. However, his profile visibly relaxed.
"If anything, you're going to try and mooch money off me so you can buy those stupid protein shit you keep stuffing. Makes me want to up-chuck every time I see you eating those things."
"Those are great for body building," retorted Akihiko. "I'm getting all my nutrients from those things."
"So does real food, dumbass. I don't see shit bars on the food pyramid."
"All right, then. Show me what you think is real food, and I don't mean at restaurants or a grocery store. How about you fire up the ovens in the Home Ec room? I bet it's easy for you, since you can just scare your way into getting a space, since the girls think you're some sort of yakuza wannabe. But, I bet they're going to change their minds once they see you in a frilly pink apron…"
"Shut it, Aki," grumbled Shinjiro, his face darkening.
"You know, some of the boxing guys think that girls go crazy over tough guys that can cook. It softens them up a bit, makes them more approachable." Shinjiro grimaced distastefully, much to Akihiko's delight.
"Since you claim to be my manager, use your managing skills to divert the girls' attention away from me. Maybe you can lure them away by baking a cake and when they're gushing all over you and how well you used frosting, I can stroll right out of school without a hitch."
Akihiko suddenly found himself in a suffocating choke hold underneath Shinjiro's armpits. He struggled to get out of the death grip, but it was futile; Shinji's skills can be compared to Heracles' taming of the Nemean Lion.
"See if you can get out of this without a hitch," challenged Shinjiro, smirking when he heard the despairing gags from Akihiko.
The soft glow of the lamp next to his bed was the only light in the room. Shinjiro had already gone to sleep, giving only quiet snores in any response. Akihiko laid on the bed, propping his head against the iron head board as he read his textbook on Japanese history. The clock on the night stand glowed green with 11:58. He knew he needs as much sleep as he could get, but he's very close to the end of the chapter so he's holding on.
Then the lights immediately went out. The clock blinked closed and it was total darkness in the room. Akihiko looked around in confusion, wondering if the power went out for some reason. He wondered if he should alert the dorm master about it, since everyone should be asleep by now. He rolled out of bed and carefully groped his way to the door. Thankfully, the fog had let up to allow the moonlight to vaguely light the way through the windows. He felt that something was odd with the whole building, but couldn't figure out what. He walked through hallways that suddenly seemed oppressive and walked on carpeting that was too loud for bare feet to make.
He looked out the window and was greeted by fog that curled its back against the window panes. He saw the moon that glowed an eerie sallow yellow and noticed that as far as the eye could see there were no lights from the dark figures of buildings. Perhaps the power outage affected the whole neighborhood, he reasoned.
He went downstairs and realized that the whole building was completely silent.
There were no signs of people turning in their beds, no mumbles of voices, no traffic roaring distantly, and no buzz of electricity in the ceilings and outlets. No dogs were barking at the moon, and no crickets conducting a symphony in the night. For some reason, his vision seems to be playing tricks on him, maybe from the difference of the vague light of the moon and the suffocating darkness of the building, but there were clouds of darkness swaying in the corners of his eyes and in the far away distance in front of him.
He slowly climbed downstairs, knowing that that's where the adults would sleep, a very slow feeling of dread thickening with each step down. He flinched when his hand touched the rail, feeling something sticky on his palm, prompting him to let go and try to rub it away. He descended on the ground floor, and in the light from outside, he was completely unprepared of what he had seen.
A looming coffin, framed against double glass doors, waiting, waiting.
…Now I really hoped that I wasn't too OOC with the characters. I personally thought that The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock was kind of creepy, so I thought to use that here. Be sure to expect more despairing T. S. Eliot soon. Are my internal monologues okay and appropriate. Do they seem out of place? That's what I'm trying to look for, seeing if things feel awkward or just plain weird. How's my pacing? I like it when people tell me these things. And ok, I lied; I didn't find a place to put Mitsuru mentionings in. At least a specific Mitsuru mentioning. Next to see: Akihiko's interview. And the person interviewing him is a familiar face to us all. Also, I've started College (abashed)... so I might not have too much time working on my story (gasp). But I am dedicated to it! Not a minute goes by without me thinking out a scene to write in. I think once I get in the swing of things, things will go smoothly for a lot of things, including this.