I.

Himawari-sou, or Sunflower Hall, where Shinji lived, was originally a barracks.

According to an urban legend it had housed a 'kamikaze' unit in the days leading up to Japan's surrender in World War II, after which its men, who had longed to lay down their lives for the Emperor, grew so distraught with shame, that one half took matters into their own hands, while the remainder took to drink, debauchery and vice before dying miserably as well, of syphilis, and cirrhosis of the liver.

And it was said that their vengeful spirits still wandered the corridors of this now student boarding-house. Most likely this was a fiction, but it was widely held to be the reason for the less-than-upright moral character of the present lodgers.

It was like every delinquent, layabout and idler from the city's three schools had gathered here for a summit. The landlady was a sweet old woman who was going blind, and probably deaf also. Under her auspices, Sunflower Hall became a kind of student-run den of iniquity…

Alcohol was a given in any dorm, but the residents at Sunflower also showed a precocious taste for gambling. When Shinji moved in he was shocked at the dice games run out in the open, in smoky dorm rooms, with students crowding the table, waiting on edge for the dealer to lift the cup; the kind of scene you might expect to see in an Edo-period historical drama; certainly not in modern Japan. But without quite knowing it, Shinji had entered a different world.

When they ran out of money, they gambled their cigarettes; and the only brand they smoked was called "Never Knows Best."

Shinji had declared at the outset that he'd have nothing to do with this crowd; he was an honors student for Christ's sake. Anyway it was impossible to study when everyone else on his floor was busy partying; and in this house the 'weekend' had a strange tendency to begin as early as Wednesday. So it was out of necessity that he had to spend most of his time elsewhere, usually in the library or in his private study.

But, this was also a problem. Such was the imagination of the average Sunflower Hall resident, that the mere fact that Shinji was frequently away led to rumors that he was out seeing a girl. When one of them happened to spot him with Misato in a coffee shop one day, word quickly spread confirming his reputation as a ladies man, and what was more, that he had a fetish for older women.

Passing him by in the hall, they would wink at him. It was intolerable...

Or at night, when he was letting himself in through the gate, the groundskeeper himself would offer him an inexplicable fist bump. "What's up, playboy..."

Their attitude towards him, which so far had been indulgent but guarded—the way members of a primitive tribe might treat an anthropologist living in their midst—also relaxed considerably. In short, though it took him a while to find out what exactly had occasioned the change, he had become "one of them".

Shinji was none too pleased with this development. In the first place, he'd only moved to Himawari-sou because the rent here was cheap.

First years were mandated to live in one of the on-campus dorms, but Shinji, now in his second-year, had opted again to continue living apart from Misato, in an independent boarding-house, purely out of consideration for her dating life. Ignorant of the place's reputation, and seeking only to economize, he had gone ahead and signed a year's lease. And now he was stuck…

The more familiarly the others treated him, the more it bristled his sense of pride. He was nothing like these slackers and wretches. Even now during the summer break, he'd picked up a job teaching English. He didn't speak a word of English, but as they say, teaching others is how you learn.

On the day Shinji was to see Asuka, he woke up much later than was his habit. It was past 11. The light from his window—it was again a clear, bright day, and dust motes drifted through the sunbeam—had advanced all the way to the middle of his tiny four-and-a-half-tatami mat room, barely spacious enough to hold a futon and a small table on which to eat and study.

There was a tiny electric stove on the table, and on that was a dented kettle. Chopsticks were left leaning inside a few empty cups of ramen, their paper sleeves scattered about.

Last night he'd had trouble sleeping. He tossed and turned a while in his futon, but eventually gave up, turned on his bedside lamp and picked up the novel he had been reading.

And, as tends to happen when you fall asleep reading a book, he had a strangely vivid dream…

It was of course a dream of Asuka. He was hanging up clothes to dry on Misato's veranda. She was sitting off to the side on a wooden stool. A dove had alighted on her finger, and she was feeding it some grains from her palm.

When Shinji looked at her again, she returned his smile, but in that time a couple more doves had come and settled on her shoulders. The doves' eyes and their talons, which now dug into the suspenders of her uniform, were the same bright crimson shade, and made an unearthly contrast with their snow-white wings.

Shinji kept hanging the laundry up on pegs, which for some reason happened to include his old plugsuit, and now and then stole glances at Asuka. More and more doves fluttered in over the railing and perched on her arms and legs.

Soon she was fairly mobbed by doves. She scattered the grains onto the veranda, but this only attracted more of them. She shook them off, and beat at her skirt and sleeves, and they would fly away, only to return and again affix themselves by their sharp claws to her uniform and start vigorously flapping their wings.

It suddenly dawned on Shinji that Asuka was in danger; right at that moment she let out a cry, and he turned to see that the doves were carrying her away! Enough of them had gathered now to lift her off the ground, and she was now being borne over the railing on a white feathery cloud.

"Asuka!" Shinji rushed to the railing. "Take my hand!" He stood on tiptoe and stretched out his arm as far as it would go. Asuka likewise extended her own.

Briefly, their fingertips brushed together… only to drift apart a second later. It was too late. He grit his teeth and slammed his fist onto the railing. If only he himself would sprout wings!

Asuka didn't seem to mind though. Rather she pulled down one eyelid and stuck out her tongue as the doves carried her off into the sunset.

"See you later, baka Shinji!"

He jerked awake. The book was still open on his chest. He put it aside and rolled out of his futon. A quick glance at the wall clock told him it was already past eleven. Much later than he was accustomed to getting up.

He took a shower, then got dressed, buttoning up his shirt by the mirror on the inner side of his closet door. On the opposite door was a calendar. He remembered his promise to Misato and let out a little groan. Then he took out his phone and flipped it open:

[09:34] Misato: Are you on your way?

[09:34] Asuka is up

[10:11] …

[10:12] Come quick…

[10:12] It's awkward…

He flipped it shut again. Well, he did tell her he would come, but he never said when. She and Asuka could use a little more bonding time.

First things first. It was time for coffee. He would stop by Fuga's room.

II.

Sanshiro Fuga was one of the only other lodgers that Shinji considered a friend, in the same way that he considered Touji or Kensuke his friends. Compared to the others at the boarding-house, they both stuck out like sore thumbs; Shinji for his relative normalcy, Fuga for an eccentricity that went above and beyond everyone else's.

Nobody knew how old he was, or when he would graduate. Rumor had it he'd been at Todai since before Third Impact, and had changed his major enough times to have had a survey of all fields of human knowledge, before finally settling, now, on Japanese literature.

Possibly he had crossed the age of thirty, but it was no longer possible to tell. He was a living anachronism. He wore his hair in a samurai-style topknot, and went around in a yukata and wooden clogs, carrying a folding fan, and, on rainy days, an old-fashioned paper umbrella. His kindly face was shaped like a large gourd. He was well known as a skilled flower arranger.

They had caught each other's eye early on, passing each other between the bookshelves at the library, or Shinji would see him ducking out of the curtains of a tea house, and they'd exchange polite smiles.

One day, however, it happened that Fuga had borrowed a book that Shinji was very much interested in.

Shinji stopped by his room to see if he was done with it. He said he was, and also invited Shinji in for a cup of tea, where they got to talking, and ended up hitting it off over their shared literary tastes.

Fuga's room was on the top floor of Sunflower House, the quietest—relatively speaking, anyway—where only upperclassmen lived. It was at the very back of the house, and at seven tatami mats was easily the largest, and the only one with a balcony, which overlooked the backyard with its moss-covered stones and peach blossom trees, now sadly out of season. Mounted over the railing were planters of various rare and exotic floral cultivars that Fuga grew for his personal use.

Today when Shinji went up to his door, the hall was already permeated with the warm, appetizing scent of coffee. That would have to be the new espresso machine. Fuga, not usually one for gadgets, had recently acquired it on a whim, and was so thrilled with it that he'd been inviting all his friends to try a sample; Shinji was probably the only one who hadn't yet had a look.

Shinji knocked, and shortly afterwards, the door swung open.

"Welcome, friend Ikari, welcome…" Fuga greeted him warmly in his usual pompous manner. "You come at the perfect time. I was just brewing myself an 'espresso'"

He was led to the table, where Fuga showed him the little silver coffee machine.

"Such a nifty little thing… cost me less than 3000 yen, if you can believe it…" he said. Then, looking at Shinji: "You look like you've just rolled out of bed. How about a double shot to wake you up?"

"I leave it up to you, Fuga-senpai," said Shinji, with a grin, as he took his seat at the table.

Fuga nodded approvingly, and reached over to a tin of coffee beans that lay on his dresser table, then carefully scooped some out into a compartment of the espresso machine. He closed the lid, and then depressed the button on top with both his hands. Presently the whirring noise of the grinder filled the air. He had to speak up over the din:

"Yes, I've decided it's finally time for me to get on board with technological progress," he said. "Why, I have just heard they've come out with a new kind of Walkman, one that's capable of playing those new-fangled CDs—a so-called 'Disc'man. Astounding, really…"

"Then I guess I know what to get you for your birthday!" said Shinji, also in a raised voice.

Presently the grinding ceased, and after a short while of a boiling, bubbling, vibrating sort of sound, a small volume of extremely strong coffee was dispensed by the machine into the tiny white cup waiting below, in an equally tiny white plate.

"Please, friend, your company is gift enough," Fuga said, as he served Shinji his double espresso, before settling into the seat directly across from him. "Although, you know I could never turn down a bottle of sake. Well then, cheers," he added, lifting his own little cup and clinking it against Shinji's.

They sipped their espresso. To Shinji's undeveloped palate, the espresso tasted only bitter, but it was a bitterness he found enlivening. In Misato's fridge was a half-eaten bar of dark chocolate wrapped in foil; it would be nice to have it now, Shinji thought. On its own it was quite unpleasantly bitter, but paired with this coffee it might even taste a bit sweet.

"I'm not a connoisseur or anything," Shinji said finally, "But this is fantastic."

"Indeed. I have always preferred tea, as you know, but this may make a convert of me yet…"

The topic turned to story Fuga had been writing for the Todai student journal Undercurrents, about an angel who was cast out of heaven for the sin of sloth, and ultimately rose up to become a minor government official here on Earth. It seems inspiration had deserted him, and he had had to put the final installment on hold due to his writer's block. Every time he sat in front of his draft, he said, it would slope up sharply until it became a daunting cliff face, impossible to scale. Shinji was of the opinion he should throw everything out and start over, but he himself wasn't so sure.

He spoke animatedly, with a lot of hand movement, and as he did so the sheer curtains behind him would billow up full of white sunlight. Against the adjacent wall, in an alcove, was a vase containing his latest flower arrangement—some avant-garde assemblage of azaleas, irises, dry twigs and dead leaves from the front lawn. Above it hung a calligraphic scroll inscribed with some kanji characters Shinji couldn't quite make out.

It didn't take long for the two friends to finish their coffee. Shinji spoke up:

"I forgot to thank you for the lilacs the other day," he said.

Fuga smiled. "I trust they went over well with your lady friend?"

Shinji rolled his eyes. "For the last time, it's nothing like that…"

"I kid, I kid. You are only too virtuous, my friend."

"But yes," said Shinji. "They were a big hit. So thank you."

The older man nodded, his self-satisfaction apparent on his face. "Lilacs, gathered at the end of spring, when their color is most pleasing, are symbols of eternal youth… when you explained the situation to me, there could have been no doubt about the prescription; after all, there is no ailment of the soul that doesn't have its answer in the language of flowers," he said.

Then, smiling coyly to himself, he ventured to add: "And so tell me, Ikari-dono, what is weighing on you today?"

Shinji almost spat out his coffee. He tugged at his collar and looked off to the side. "What do you mean…"

"Usually when you drop in, it's because there's something on your mind. Now, out with it…!"

Shinji raised both his palms in denial, feeling embarrassed. "I assure you, if that's the case, it's not on purpose," he said. "I'm just a person with a lot of cares…"

"And I happen to enjoy listening to people's worries. Why, it could be material for my next story. So please, there's no need to feel reserved."

Shinji thought about it. "Well, now that you mention it… I don't suppose you know how to interpret dreams?"

"Unfortunately, I don't," Fuga replied. "Although if you like, I can put you in touch with a good psychic that I know of…"

"Oh well, never mind then," said Shinji with a sigh. "I think I have a pretty good idea what it means, anyhow. There's something that's been keeping me up lately, you see. It's like this…"

Fuga inclined his ear; Shinji took a deep breath, and proceeded to explain all about the situation with Asuka.

It was a difficult subject because it was so emotionally fraught. Shinji always had a hard time talking about his emotions. His was a sensitive and easily wounded soul, which, because it was so sensitive, responded to the outside world only with precise, delicate adjustments of mood, of a scale proportionate to his vast capacity for feeling, like the mercury in a finely graduated thermometer. As a result, people tended to think of him as aloof and unemotional, when it was just the opposite that was true.

Some poets were able to do their feelings justice in their words, but a poet Shinji was not; he only had access to the language of the everyday, in which a word like 'love', or for that matter 'regret', once uttered, took on dimensions that were totally overblown and inappropriate to the delicate sentiments he wished to convey, and were sure to give his listener the impression that he was putting on airs, cribbing his speech from the hackneyed language of movies and romance novels; worse still, they would make his emotions appear crass and unjustifiable to his own self.

The sentiments closest to his heart were therefore those he was least willing to articulate. And the taboo at the center of all taboos had to do with a girl called "Asuka".

You can therefore imagine how haltingly Shinji's explanation proceeded. He had only launched into it out of respect for the wisdom of his listener, a mad, impulsive risk it seemed now, as he grasped at sentences like straws, struggling to make his thoughts intelligible. Circling the point in roundabout, euphemistic terms, he would think he found a viable approach at last, only to run into the invisible wall of an unutterable word and fall silent, his cheeks burning with shame. Then he would begin again—

"Well…"

"That is to say… I only mean…"

"She and I were… You know…"

"We weren't like, dating dating, but…"

After a while of this, Fuga put up his hand. "I've heard enough."

Shinji fell silent. He felt he had only succeeded in making a hash of his thoughts and humiliating himself. Probably this was because he himself didn't know how to interpret his feelings towards Asuka. He traced with his eyes the wood grain of the table and silently cursed himself…

His listener, though, had gotten up without making a reply and stepped out onto the balcony. Whether this was because Fuga was embarrassed for him Shinji didn't know, but he returned shortly with a few sprigs of flowers.

This is hardly a situation that calls for flowers, Shinji wanted to say, but Fuga was already binding their stems in twine, and he proceeded to wrap the four or five blooms in wax paper, making a modest but dignified bouquet. This with a flourish he presented to Shinji.

"These are…"

"Forget-me-nots," said Fuga with a smile. "If she's even slightly Japanese, she'll understand what they mean. I must say, Ikari-san, I never thought you'd turn out to be such a romantic, but it's a temperament that suits you. Oh, to be young and in love…"

Shinji reluctantly accepted the lot. He was sure that Fuga had completely misunderstood him, but he was embarrassed enough for himself to want to end the interaction and get out of there. Could flowers really express the feelings he couldn't put in words?

He looked down at the forget-me-nots: small star-shaped flowers each with five broad, pale-blue petals radiating from a dense bright yellow button in the center. The morning dew still glistened on the petals. Sure enough, they seemed to be brimming with a kind of benign promise.

"Now off you go, champ," said Fuga, patting Shinji on the back. "As for myself, I gotta hit the pachinko machines before the lunch hour rush. Remember—when in doubt, just be yourself!"

"Gee thanks, that's great advice…", muttered Shinji, following him through the door.

But Fuga was already out of earshot. Striding away, he shook his hand goodbye without turning around to look, and soon enough he was out of sight, only the clacking of his wooden sandals echoing through the stairwell.

AUTHOR'S NOTE:

Well, this chapter took me much longer than expected to write. It went through a few different revisions, but in the process I ended up generating a lot of material for later chapters. I'm still not completely satisfied, but I figured I'd upload it to keep the story moving.

Guest, SleepyweepyAF, YourBlandestNightmare, JazzCabbage, Guest, Guest, skyf0x, Guest, Sunsetman, thank you all very much for your reviews, and thank you to everyone who favorited and followed. Particularly thanks skyf0x for the long and detailed review, I don't mind criticism at all, so I appreciate the scrutiny, and you bring up some valid concerns. For most of them I can only right now say that they should hopefully be answered once the circumstances of Shinji and Asuka's relationship become clearer, which so far I have intentionally kept vague (though maybe this chapter contains enough of a hint). I can't promise the answer will be entirely satisfactory to everyone, but I hope to do my best given the premise and my limited skill as a writer.

I've made made some slight edits to Chapter 1, the most important of which is that Shinji's last name is now still just Ikari. After reviewing my plan for the story, I decided the plot point centering around him changing his last name was too minor to bother with and just detracted from the focus of the story, which is Shinji and Asuka's relationship. Hopefully there shouldn't be any more retcons going forward.

This is also a good place as any to mention that 'Todai' which I keep using is just the actual short form of Tokyo Daigaku, or Tokyo University.

Lastly, once again, your reviews are appreciated, they give me strength to write, help me improve and also help decide the future course of this story, so please keep them coming in.

Next chapter should finally contain the long-awaited meeting between Shinji and Asuka. I wanted to include it in this chapter, but I felt it was already getting too long. Or could it stand to be longer? If you have any opinions on the chapter length let me know as well.

Peace! See you all in the next installment.