Half-Empty, Half-full, Either Way it's Filled with Blood
A/n at the bottom
Warning: Slight Gore, Ghosts, The Spooks, Disturbing Images, Creepy Teenagers,
A big thanks to for helping me with the Spanish corrections.
The first step to being normal was changing her surname in Mai's opinion. Abasolo became Taniyama, her mother's maiden name. She didn't have a lot of money so a job was a must. Mai begin searching. She settled on a coffee shop tea house combination. She was hired almost immediately. Oki-sensei was a worry-wart and insisted staying with Mai until she had to go back to teaching.
Mai first year of high school was eventful for her. She made two friends that were actually alive. Keiko and Michiru were ghost story fanatics and loved listening to Mai tell them. Mai on the other hand hated telling the stories. Mostly because they all were either based on her dreams or something she had experienced. The two girls never seemed to notice.
Mai had to deal with annoying customers at her work. Attempted skirt flips, wandering hands, there was a reason the shop was so eager for a worker. Still, Mai need the money and was really only good at making hot beverages. Also the tea and coffee shop was close to her apartment.
Mai's apartment was a rather dingy looking thing. There was one bedroom, a bathroom, one closet, and a kitchenette-living room. There rooms had yellowed walls, a disgusting brown carpet that looked like it had been there since the building was new, and leaky faucets. A block down from the complex was a laundromat and a convenience store.
The block in between the apartment complex and the convenience store laundromat was fill to the brim with ghosts. Mai couldn't get a package of cup ramen without being bombarded with pleas for help. She didn't want to ignore them, but the jeers of "freak" "creepy murder girl" and "go die" rung in her head. A flash of words scrawled on her desk and flower placed on it. Mai didn't want to face treatment like that every again. So she plug her ears, lowered her eyes and kept her mouth shut.
Only sometimes that didn't work and the spirits could tell when Mai could see them. Mai wasn't clumsy; she actually had as much grace as her name suggested. However, She would be pushed, clawed, and bruised by spirits so often she just said she tripped. Mai started to purposely trip in front of people to continue the cover.
Mai's dreams were no longer safe. She were dream of death every night; most nights Mai got to directly experience it. Drowning, gunfights, stabbed, bludgeoned, hit-and-run, suicide, Mai felt it all. She would wake up at night with a scream caught in her throat. Mai learned pretty quickly how to cover up eye bags.
The end of the year came and so did finals. Keiko made it in the top fifty, MIchiru the top 100, and Mai made it in the top ten.
In late April Keiko, Mai, and MIchiru were telling ghost stories after school.
"The girl heard a scratching on her door.'Please let me in. He'll get me if You don't,' The girl opened her bedroom door and there stood her ex-boyfriend. Covered in burn scars, broken, bloody fingernails, and empty sockets were his eyes should be. 'I found you' The girl started to cry "Please you've been dead for six years, stop!'" Mai changed her voice to suit each character.
The other two girls let out a shriek.
"Mai! Why are you stories so scary!" Keiko pouted, "Our are always lame compared to your's."
"Anyway, it's my turn," Michiru began to spin a story about the school's old abandoned building. Mai only half listened knowing the story was fake.
"Okay, ready… One" Michiru started.
"Two" Mai followed.
"Three" Keiko voice held a tremor of fear.
"Four" a male's voice rang out through the classroom.
Keiko and Michiru screamed and grabbed Mai nearly strangling her in the process.
W-who's there?" Keiko stuttered
A teenager around the girl's age flicked on the lights. He had pale skin, dark clothes that weren't the school uniform, and a fake smile. He was rather handsome. Keiko and Michiru fell over themselves to get to him.
"Hey, what's your name?"
"Shibuya Kazuya," the teen answered.
"Hey, what grade are you in?" Keiko asked flirtatiously.
Another fake smile, "I'm seventeen."
Keiko and Michiru were soon squeaking all about themselves and feeding Shibuya all the information he could ever need about the school building.
Él no dio una respuesta adecuada! No es un estudiante de nuestra escuela! ¿Por qué le llamas Shibuya-senpai? Él no lleva el uniforme escolar, no dijo qué grado estaba en, y le dijo a su edad!"*
The three continued to have a one sided conversation. While Mai screamed reasons not to trust the young man in her head.
"...and you?"
Mai head snapped up, "Q- What?"
"Jeez Mai pay attention! Shibuya-senpai was asking if you knew anything else about the school building."
Mai didn't look at "Shibuya-senpai." "I only know what they know."
Michiru and Keiko gaped at Mai as she went through the other door to the hallway.**
Mai made her way to school enjoying the cherry blossom trees. She felt compelled to look at the old school building. Mai peered into the building inside there was a camera, a very expensive looking camera. Mai went into the building.
"¿Alguien lo dejo aqui?"*** Mai muttered to herself.
"Who's there?" someone asked.
"Ah! Sorry I'll leave now…" Mai started to back away from the camera and bumped into a shelf.
The shelf wobbled and tipped over nearly falling on Mai and most certainly crushing the camera. Mai looked around the shelf had caused a domino effect and a man the one she assumed had called out before had been crushed.
"What happened?" it was "Shibuya-senpai.
Mai tried to explain what happened, but couldn't seem to get the words out. Shibuya was able to infer what happened.
"Where's the nearest hospital?"
"There's one right by the school entrance."
Mai offered to help, but the injured man slapped her hand away,"Thank you, but no thanks."
Shibuya looked at Mai,"What's your name?"
"Why?" Mai huffed, "I have to get to class." She stomped out of the building feeling guilty.
Mai packed up her bag after school.
"Mai aren't you coming with to tell stories with Shibuya-senpai?" Keiko asked, grabbing her bag
"No, I have work." Mai responded curtly, still in a bad mood from the morning.
"Man your parents must be super strict!" Michiru whined flopping across her desk.
"Something like that."
"Excuse me…"
"Oh Kuroda-san we were just-" Keiko smiled.
"What were you just talking about." Kuroda cut her off.
"We're going to tell ghost stories." Michiru huffed at the girl.
"GHOST STORIES!" the normally quiet girl shouted.
There was a knock on the door and there in a his fake smiling glory was Shibuya. "Is this Taniyama-san's class?"
Descubierta. Mai backed away slightly. Nisiquiera le dije mi nombre****
"What grade are you in? Why are you here?" Kuroda demanded to know.
"I'm here to tell ghost stories with the girls."
No nos dijo en cual grado se encuentra!*****
Kuroda went on a rant about how the ghost stories gave her headaches or something like that. Shibuya countered all of her words with logical facts. Mai was certain that Kuroda was making thing up. She was also pretty sure she should be getting to work, but watching the verbal spar seemed much more entertaining than getting harassed so she stayed. After the argument between Kuroda and Shibuya neither Keiko nor Michiru were every interested in telling stories.
"Oh, ah, Taniyama-san, can I talk to you for a sec?" Shibuya asked from the doorway.
¿Qué tal, ¿no?****** "Um...sure?"
So I used the website www . translate . com (remove spaces) I don't know if this is an accurate site? But, hey anything is better than google translate.
Someone told me the Spainish is distracting. However, this is one of the ways Mai honnors her father so it's staying. The next one will show up in the next chapter.
Now for the translations.
*Él no dio una respuesta adecuada! No es un estudiante de nuestra escuela! ¿Por qué le llamas Shibuya estudiantes? Él no lleva el uniforme escolar, no dijo qué grado estaba en, y le dijo a su edad!" -basically pointing out Naru isn't a student he isn't wearing a uniform, he didn't tell them what grade he was in only his age so why are you calling him senpai
**Michiru and Keiko gaped at Mai as she went through the other door to the hallway. -This is more Mai speaking in a very informal/rude manner to someone that's older who she's just met, big no-no
***"¿Alguien dejarlo aquí?"- did someone leave it here, referring to the camera that gets broken
****Que he encontrado. Mai backed away slightly. Incluso le dije mi nombre. -I've been found… I didn't even tell him my name
*****No nos dijo en qué grado se encuentra en - he hasn't told us what grade he's in
******¿Qué tal, ¿no?- how about, no?