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Post by Kaez on May 18, 2015 14:20:55 GMT -5
“It’s nice out here tonight.”
Angel looked to her friend Roseluck. Considering the long silence that had just passed between them, the words took her by surprise. The view from the balcony was incredible, of course. They were mid-level on the Watchlight Tower overlooking New Chicago’s grand skyline, Lake Michigan's glimmering waters on the horizon. The setting of the sun behind them was casting a brilliant orange light on the distant waves and a gentle breeze of cool lake air wafted through every minute or so. It was beautiful.
But not as beautiful as Roseluck, Angel thought to herself, glad that they were alone now. She wanted to say it aloud, to share what she was feeling, but no words felt right. From what she little she had learned of being human, Angel had come to know that you needed to be in a relationship for a very long while before you could really and properly love someone. Time and devotion and commitment were all integral to statements of love. But, then, why did her stomach twist at the thought of just saying two words to Roseluck? The thought of asking her if she wished to be a couple, or saying that she loved her, brought on waves of strange and fluttering feelings that left her dizzy and nervous.
But what else made sense? Angel hung on Roseluck’s every word, following her every step and agreeing with everything she said. It was as though she was made to be near her.
As the silence resettled, still and cool on the night air, Angel stole a peripheral glance at Roseluck whose eyes reflected the oranges and pinks of the lake. Her hair, catching the faint evening light, was shades of red and brown in turns. Angel focused again on those far shores, silently berating herself. Even if she couldn't confess to her the way that Roseluck made her stomach churn, the way she made her feel like she was tumbling through the air, she needed to say something.
“Roseluck, what is love?”
She berated herself again. A million things to say and she went with that? The brain of a supercomputer and she couldn’t think of something less obtuse? She turned nervously towards her scarlet-haired crush to see her, with a mixed wave of relief and uncertainty, smiling slyly.
“That came out of nowhere.”
Angel blushed, and was glad that Roseluck's gaze remained focused out there beyond the skyline rather than on her blushing cheeks and wobbling knees.
“I was w-wondering,” she stuttered. “I've heard Tyson and Chris say they love each other so many times. I... I just want to know what it really means.”
She looked back to Rose, gauging her reaction. There was something equally intoxicating and frustrating about how difficult she was to read. Her smile opened wider and her brow raised.
“Well,” Roseluck said, her chin perking up. “I’m sorry to disappoint, but I’m not really sure how to explain this for you. I know how much trouble you have with emotions.”
This was true, Angel admitted to herself, though hearing the words from Roseluck strangely stung. The scientists that had created her were more concerned with jump-starting humanity’s evolution than they were with processing the illogical nuances of romance. Angel had learned quite a bit in the two years since Roseluck and her friends had found her, but she wasn't fooling anyone yet.
Roseluck turned to face Angel and instantly her stomach contorted like it had been filled with helium and feathers. “I want you to imagine a star going supernova,” Roseluck said in a quiet, building voice. “That’s it. Because when you see the person you love, it feels like a star is exploding right in your heart. Just a massive explosion of emotion. Simultaneously the most beautiful and the most torturous feeling in the world.”
Angel watched Roseluck's eyes and mouth and hands and tried to restrain the nervous unsteadiness of her legs. The feathers in her stomach tickled up into her chest.
And she could feel that a star was exploding behind her ribs.
She had to tell her. Tonight.
“Have you ever felt that way about someone?” Angel asked.
Roseluck shrugged and smiled again. “Maybe.”
Angel frowned. Maybes were non-answers, they didn’t mean anything. She was no closer than she was a few moments ago. The supernova had become agonizing.
Roseluck’s reached out a hand and rested it on Angel's, and for a moment she thought she was going to implode.
“Have you?” Roseluck asked her, in a tone that seemed to toe the fine line between sheepish and coy.
Angel didn’t respond, just blushed again and looked away. How had it first happened? When did it first overcome her? Was it the very first moment she saw Roseluck? Was it when she first spoke? She felt like she had loved her forever. She knew she would love her forever.
“I feel what you’re feeling Angel,” Roseluck sighed knowingly. Angel was frozen solid. Her whole body stiffened and contracted and her stomach was in a million knots, her breathing screeched to a halt and her eyes hung wide, unblinking. “It's such a strong and genuine feeling,” Roseluck continued, extending her other hand to stroke Angel’s rose-colored hair. “I didn’t even have to reach out for it. You wear it on your sleeve, Angel, no matter how much you try to keep it pent up. Just let it happen. Open up. I feel it too."
Their eyes caught the last rays of the setting sun and a breeze of cool, lake air fell over the porch. Angel couldn't take it anymore.
She lunged in, wrapping her arms around Roseluck and planting her lips firmly on Roseluck’s. She could feel her initial shock, she wasn’t expecting something so sudden, then she could feel her recover, her lips curling to a smile, and returning the kiss and embrace. An eternity seemed to pass before their lips parted, and they stood, falling into one another, supporting one another, embraced and whole. The knot in her stomach had released after what seemed like lifetimes of tension.
“I love you,” Angel finally said, sobbing happily. “Ever since that moment you woke me up and saved me, I have always loved you.” Tears streamed down Angel's cheeks as Roseluck held her, smiling ear-to-ear. "This is what love is. I know what love is."
“I love you, Angel,” Roseluck smiled.
They stood, smiling wide, hand-in-hand, looking out over the lake as the oranges and reds faded into purples and deep blues, the first few stars shining above them. One thought kept returning to Angel's mind every time she looked into Roseluck's eyes.
It really was nice out tonight. |
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Post by ASGetty ((Zovo)) on May 18, 2015 17:58:32 GMT -5
My eyes shudder open, as slowly as tectonic plates, and the Milky Way glistens before me. There it is, an endless froth of stars fountaining from a vanilla centre. Each one shimmers like a rhinestone, fighting for real estate in my retinas. I glance left and cantaloupe coloured Saturn looms, it’s rings cutting across the ceiling like a knife blade. Ah, ceiling. Space is nothing more than smoke and mirrors, the cosmic-scape no more real than the Rolex strapped upon my wrist.
I realize that’s the only thing I’m wearing. Beneath bed sheets the texture of aluminum foil, my body is as bare as Adam. As if my words were anticipated, a peak to the right of me indicates that I am in the presence of an Eve. Her bare back faces me, pale skin glowing in the light, entwined with its own constellations of freckles.
This is not my apartment. The natural ambiance of a single dim light and the skittering of cockroaches has been replaced by a galactic tapestry and some acid trip-hop soundtrack on repeat.
My brain lurches into first gear, stalls, restarts, and then lurches again. Body, mind and soul try to decide if I’m still drunk or riding the peak of a killer hangover. Body fights for action, but mind and soul plant their flags firmly in the latter category, causing my first attempt to stand upright to crash like a deck of cards. My back slams hideously on the hard mattress, but Eve beside me doesn't move an inch.
It was, what, five tequila last night? Not the main set, mind you. But rather the outro, the final punctuation mark to a hideous run on sentence containing crashed weddings, broken hearts, cocktails, beers, and sake…just thinking about it makes my mind burn.
Realizing my intentions and body are not exactly on cooperating terms, I decide to soak in my bedmate. At a glance, certainly more alluring than Melody. My hand skitters upon her back, and I lean over her, trying to sneak the slightest glimpse of her face. A cheek comes into view, and a nose, and it’s enough. Prematurely, naively, a future begins to cement itself. This Eve of mine. The catch of the night. Have her wake up in the embrace of my arms. Have her trace her fingers upon the small of my back. Have our lips embrace, our tongues entwine…
My eyes notice it, south of the face, above two symmetrical breasts. A tattoo.
Shit…the peacock…
She’s stirs, giving a yawn that crescendos into a blurred murmur. There’s the prompt, and my body flies from the crime scene, dressing in a whirlwind, leaving behind the scent of drunken love and–for shame, Cale–bondage shrapnel.
Eve is waking to a galactic sunrise as I exit stage left.
I’m in a hallway. I have burst through a tangerine door into a stretch of space consisting of identical tangerine doors. Two revelations crash land into me at once. One, I have somehow, shambled into a Tokyo Love Hotel that is almost certainly in the upper stratosphere of Love Hotel prices. Considering my budget has yet to exceed an altitude of shantytown hostels, this is cause for concern. Second, is that the date has to be November 14th, 2015.
Heart flutters, hop scotching over a beat, as I thrust my watch into my face. Big hand is dripping towards ten, while the little hand kisses the twenty five. Still an hour and a half, more than enough time, to witness the spectacle.
An eclipse. A total solar eclipse. The crème de la crème of celestial events. Live in Tokyo for just shy of three minutes.
Call me foolish to drink the night before E-Day, clap me on the head for crashing a wedding and chuckle condescendingly at my obnoxiously poor timing of one night stands. But what else is a recently single twenty four year old to do in Tokyo? Boot on the laptop and see what messages have flown in from the West? See who pretends to miss you? Lie to the parents when you’re coming back? That’s not even mentioning Melody. She’s probably still cranking the propaganda machine. Sharing the lesser snippets of our relationships, trying to show the world the version of me with Sharpied on horns and demon eyes. No, I could not succumb to cabin fever. Gaze from the window of the hostel, the neon scorches all the way to the horizon. You close your eyes and it remains bruised upon your lids. It’s temptation manifest, attracts tourist like honey seduces bears, reeling me from the allure of a full night’s rest into a new hyper-reality.
The rest, as all significant people would write, is history. The tale is faded, scratched and smudged beyond repair. Perhaps Miss Peacock back in the Galaxy Room can fill in a few of the blank spaces, but I’m in no inclination to return. While it feels as fresh as flying to have a one-night stand it’s a pity it had to be with a girl who would rival Melody in the passive aggressive Olympics. Instead I push forward, doors shuttering by like a strip of film on either side of me.
There’s a commotion at the elevator bank. It’s near surreal seeing another person in a building like this, but there she is, a Tokyo native saturated with stench of last night–scarlet cocktail dress, nylon glossed legs, heels, make up. A violin case swings limply in one arm. A finger jams against a brass button. She’s adhering to the universally false doctrine of elevator summoning: the faster you press the faster they come…
An encounter is inevitable, and my mind is churning with the impossible task of avoiding the twenty floor descent of awkward silence. There’s no way to work around the idea that small talk in a Love Hotel is most certainly social taboo.
Suddenly, the placidity is broken. She has abandoned her flirtation with the elevator button and is charging headlong towards me…no, the stairwell, which I just so happen to be beside.
She crashes through the door as another opens up farther down the hall. My head spins, hangover reaching critical level, and I find myself pulled in by her gravity, my feet unconsciously shuffling through the passage, hands thrust out to keep the door from slamming upon my face.
She’s already a rouge blur down the stairs, when my mouth opens and voice calls out, catching up to her.
“Is there a problem with the elevator?”
I manage to snare her mid step, she pauses and replies, not bothering to turn around. “I’m not one to share lift rides with shitty boys.”
Her English is near impeccable, indicative of some time spent in the West, and the comment pricks my ego. “Harsh.”
This conjures a one-note laugh. “Not you, the other boy, from the room.”
I could crack my head upon the bare concrete of the stairwell, but my stupidity would remain. “Of course, of course…”
“You could say I’m in the process of making a swift departure.”
“That makes two of us.” I feel regrets come a-plenty in this building of manufactured lust.
“How funny.” Her face says the contrary and she continues her sweep down the stairwell, moving with hypnotic determination.
My eyes fidget to the door behind me, before whipping back down. Sometimes it’s necessary to take the scenic route, my diet has taken a turn for the worse come Japan and I don’t think I’ve had a proper work out since College. And was that not the whole point of this spontaneous decision? A change? An evolution? Out with the old Cale, in with the new.
But didn't I meet Melody on a stairwell? Rather not have a case of déjà vu. No, wait, nonsense. It was an escalator. Still close. Who the hell meets on an escalator, anyways?
Fuck it.
I take the stairs two at a time, keeping enough distance, but remaining close enough so that each turn rewards me with the slightest glimpse of scarlet fabric. Down and down we go, as repetitive as a Speedway track, left turn after left turn, plunging back to street level. Orange painted numbers are stamped to concrete at each level, counting down.
Seven…six…five…four…three…two…
We’re at the one, and there’s Scarlet Dress. Violin case rests upon the floor, and in what is an unanticipated sequel to the elevator debacle, she is now tugging upon the handle to the door that leads outside? Into the kitchens? The dark depths of Hell?
“Shit,” she mutters.
“You and building infrastructure don’t seem to be on speaking terms.” I note, stepping off of the stairs. It’s a small five-foot square landing with one door and more stairs leading deeper. Not much room to do anything.
“Emergency stairwell,” she murmurs, her sentence ending with one final tug of the door handle. “Locked.”
A knot of concern forms in my eyebrows. Locked. There’s a word that one does not want to currently hear. “Pardon?”
She gives a shallow smile, planting a finger upon a sign plastered on the door. It’s a cloud of Japanese writing and she reads it aloud once, before repeating slowly, translating into English as she goes. “In event of fire, door will unlock…”
“So?”
Who the hell smiles in such a situation? Scarlet Dress, apparently. “So, Mr. Wedding Crasher, unless you can snap up a fire, this door will stay locked. To put it simply, we’re trapped.”
“Cellphone?” I left mine back across the Pacific Ocean, on my bedroom dresser.
She conjures it into her hand. Upon the screen is a big fat image of an empty battery. “Luck is not in our favour.”
“You’re joking.” I try to play it off. Outright panicking is not my forte, but inside my body is shrieking. Eyes glance to watch and watch informs me eighty-five minutes. Eighty-five minutes till totality! And here I am stuck. I cannot permit it. I roll the sleeves up on my blazer, striding past my companion. Hands grasp upon the door handle. I pull, I yank, I strain. Sweat beads on my forehead. Not a budge. This is the Sword in the Stone and I am not King Arthur. That’s when her last comment, still echoing deep in my head, strikes a chord. “Hold up…you said Wedding Crasher’?”
I spin around to a smirking face. She’s leaning against the railing, finding my efforts amusing. Typical boy, her expression reads. “I’m not surprised you don’t remember. You’re really good at kissing tequila bottles.”
She’s going for the jugular. “You were there?”
Hand reaches down, picking up her violin, she shakes the case in front of me. “I've made a job out of it.”
The string quartet. The wedding’s centerpiece. I believe I made a scene demanding them to play Freebird, but perhaps we can skirt away from that blackhole of a discussion topic. “I may or may not remember your fiddle skills, but I have no doubt they’re impressive.”
“It’s a viola.”
Can’t she take a compliment? “The black sheep of the string quartet.”
Another thin smile. “If I had a drink for every time a person said that.”
“I’d love to know the punch line, but…” I give my watch another glance, and now it seems as if the minute hand sneaks another two notches every time I look away. I can picture the sky outside, slowly de-saturating. “If you’ll excuse me.”
I take the steps two at a time, echoes upon echoes in this white purgatory. Knees pound, joints creak, but the soundtrack in my head blazes action hero music. A big fat 2 roars up ahead, with a door beside it. I can picture it, so clearly in my mind, the thought of me grasping the handle, yanking it open and flying down the halls, that I nearly pop out my arm when the door refuses to budge. Locked. Reality is far too strict. Upwards, Higher, back from whence I came. I wonder if The Peacock is suspect of my swift exit yet, cladding herself in that lapis lazuli gown of hers, texting her fools of friends on how she got ‘stood up’.
Door Three, Nothing.
Rinse and repeat. My calves are furnaces, burning white and hot. They scream at me that it’s a futile quest, but I must. I won’t stop until every damn door has been exhausted.
Nine. Ten. Eleven. Nothing.
Is there such a thing as Karma? Perhaps it’s only prevalent in the Eastern countries, something simply wafting in the air like ozone. Is this its machinations? Who the hell did I rub the wrong way last night? Harassment? Physical altercation? Murder?
I’m beyond floors now. The doors won’t give me the time of day, let alone open for me. There’s one left, designed for midgets, presumably heading for the rooftop. Hands grip, I say a prayer to whoever resides inside the Love Hotel and twist the handle…
Can one possibly guess why I stumbled back down the stairs with a limp? Scarlet Dress takes the prize as soon as I return to ground level, drinking in my leg with a Sherlock-esque sharpness. “Get a bit frustrated?”
“Futile.” I say, collapsing down upon the lowest steps.
She raises her hands, as if declaring her innocence. “I’ll have you know I’ve been doing my civic duty while you were absent.”
“Such as?”
“Screaming and banging upon the door to no avail.” She extends her hand. “My name is Kozue.”
She says that like we’ll be stuck in here for a while, and I offer my hand, resisting the itch to look at my watch. “Cale.”
“Never heard that one before.”
“Likewise.”
Another one of those half laughs, the viola case rattles in her hand. “You familiar with a lot of Japanese names?”
Another veiled stab? Kozue’s connotations are hidden behind a soft accent. “Does it look like I’m one who would be?”
“I’d put you slightly above the bell curve.” She spins around, giving another brisk knock upon the door. We’re greeted with thunderous silence. “Every five minutes. Someone’s bound to hear us. But, what brings you to Japan?” Kozue presses an ear to the door.
I give my most honest answer. “Boredom.”
“Not enough weddings to crash?”
My turn to smile. “It was a dare, I think. I made friends with some folks who didn’t speak a lick of English, got swept away and, well, in hindsight…probably not the best idea to bust a party where only the groom’s side is Caucasian. You’re either family or some uninvited.”
“I think you put a bit of a bruise on their open bar.”
“So I can feel.” I stick a finger gun to my temple and pull the trigger.
“On the bright side.” Her face goes ripe with cheek. “Your crass jokes seemed to have produced results with that pixie cut girl.”
My expression turns sober. “She slipped away, got a Peacock instead.”
Confusion, swiftly chased away by realization. “Oh…oh shit!” Kozue laughs, not the half-note, but instead a full-sail, rippling, symphonic chorus. “Her? She was...how…how do I put it?”
Her laughter is contagious, and my reply comes out between staccato breaths. “A bitch.”
“Perhaps a bit milder.”
“Trust me, that’s being generous.”
“Fair enough. Who storms in demanding valet service?” Kozue’s hands pantomime jingling keys, before tossing them to me. “Monsieur waiter, drop the caviar and go park my Toyota.”
It’s a perfect mimic of the voice. Hand reaches out and catches. I throw them upon the wall, where they presumably slap upon the concrete before falling forgotten upon the floor. “’I will do no such thing, madame.’”
“Heresy!” She breaks role, another full laugh. It sings in my ears. “I mean, on the bright side, she can be your scapegoat for this whole debacle.”
I realize I have, if only for a moment, forgotten about the end-time goal. The picture of the sky darkening burns crisp again in my mind. Teeth bite into lip. “Inadvertently locking people into bare rooms to miss a Solar Eclipse? Total bitch move.”
“Oh shit! That is today!” Kozue gives another volley of harsh slaps upon the door, each ringing hollow.
If anything, it’s good to know I won’t be the only one missing out. “And who do you have to blame for this current predicament?”
“Someone in the Groomsmen Party.”
Flash of teeth through lipstick, she’s embarrassed. My eyes widen to the size of my smile. “Not going to specify?”
A blush. “You have one in five odds.”
As if she expects me to remember names. I’d have better luck opening the door with telepathy at this point. Still, I grasp at straws. “The obnoxious one, straight out from London.”
“Nope. Bleached hair beach boy.”
That asshole? If I had a drink, it would be jetting through my nostrils. “Out of all the people…”
“He plays cello.” She shrugs. “Sometimes solidarity is nice. Good for conversation.”
“Your exit this morning points to the contrary.” My hands slip in my own pocket, where a trio of coins and a key greet me. There’s a brief moment of wishful thinking: do all keys in Tokyo open all doors?
“Only takes a morning for someone to change.” Her voice trails off, and Kozue’s fingers snap at the clips on her viola case. “No one really does relationships here, anyways.”
“Part of the allure of this city,” I say, and Kozue seems to about to disagree. My hand plucks a coin from my pocket. Perhaps the doors work like vending machines. 100 yen for a swift exit.
“Sounds like there’s something more to that ‘boredom’ answer.” Kozue, for the first time, has not a single hint of wit coating her words; a slice of sincerity greets me instead. Is there a reason why people are so calm talking to complete strangers?
I don’t know the reason, but yet I peel open anyways. “Expectations, promises, obligations. A real smorgasbord of stuff. I suppose the highlight being a thirty car pile up of a broken relationship.” People always threaten to pull the ‘drop everything and run card’, but it rarely every gets played. Bless the surprise in my parents eyes when I sent them an email from the airport. Drink in the satisfaction when I shared it with Melody. But what a relief. The plane lifting off felt like a real exhale, the weight of my hometown tumbling back down to the surface below. No more presumption, no more past.
“She chased you out of the country?” Kozue asks, interest still sharp in her voice.
“Nah, I just got here first. Tokyo was on the top of her to do list. She’ll just have to live vicariously through what could have been.”
“Pretty silly to go to a different country for petty revenge if you ask me.”
I shrug. “It was a bit more than that.”
“A bit?” Her look tells me she hardly buys it. “When do you return, then?”
“That’s the thing. I told my parents it was only a month long experiment. In reality, I haven’t bought a ticket back.”
“That will be one hell of a Skype call.”
“Looking forward to it.” Coin flips between fingers. What’s the process for lawsuits in Tokyo? Love Hotel management is going to have a field day when I burst from this purgatory. At the very least, company is nice. “You get along with your parents?”
The laugh returns, bone dry. “A little disagreement with my career choice. They wanted my to learn an instrument, they just didn’t expect me to take it this seriously.”
“So playing weddings is a bit of a full time gig?”
“Not supposed to be, but two failed Orchestra auditions later…” Kozue punctuates the sentence with a shrug, brown eyes softening.
“I’m sorry to hear that.” I want to compliment her playing, but tequila and sake has evaporated any knowledge of it. Western and Japanese fusion truly is a cardinal sin.
“Well, the good thing is that Beethoven’s Ninth will be around every New Years. Bit of a tradition in Tokyo.”
“Is that the dream then?”
She hesitates, as if it’s more embarrassing than discussing Love Hotel hook ups. “That it is.”
I try to remember the last point when I knew what I was going to do. Even harder– when I knew what I wanted to do. Tokyo could almost count, but it still rings as more as an act of desperation. As an opportunity to jump from a burning building. “That’s a good one. Good song, too.”
“Good song…” Amusement blooms fresh on her face for an encore, if just for a second. “It’s simply the best. One of the first things I remember hearing as a child. And, as odd as it is, I feel like I have accomplished it, some other version of me. One who practiced harder, was more talented. One who kept focus.” Kozue shrugs, and she turns to the door. Its surface is brushed steel and a blurred reflection of her stares back.
“Nonsense, there’s no sound in mirror world.” I say, standing up to face my own reflection.
“Yes, but they have the benefit of always appearing prettier.” Kozue reaches out, hand grazing the door handle again, not pulling but just staying there. “You get so used to your mirror version, that any image of real you feels…lesser.”
“Perhaps you ought to get third party opinions more. Although, I must admit, this is starting to sound like a morning conversation I was meant to be sharing with the Peacock back upstairs.”
Eye-roll, that’s a new one. “I wouldn’t wish that fate upon my worst enemy.”
“How about being locked in a room, while celestial forces flirt outside?” My watch scream for attention, but I refuse. Willpower will get me through this.
“I’m certain there’s a place like that somewhere in Tokyo,” Kozue gives a double eye-roll. “We’re quite savvy with filling that niche market.”
“I’ve noticed.”
She looks back at me. “That’s Japan for you. Visited one of those Maid Cafes yet?”
“Would you be disappointed if I said yes?” Women dressed in frills and skirts, a taste of France in Tokyo. The fad had taken off recently.
“Would you be disappointed if I said I worked at one?”
“Back off!” I laugh. “This is supposed to be my embarrassing moment.”
“Never. You lack the home field advantage.”
“I hope you at least dialed down the snark.”
“Meh, just a tad.” Kozue walks back slowly from the door, sitting back down on the steps, viola case resting on her lap. “The artificialness of it killed me, though. Playing a character constantly. Pretending to be interested in the people you were serving. Small-talk for the sake of small talk.”
“Sounds exhausting.”
“You have no idea. It feels like it’s cheaper to pay for a relationship here than to actually get one. No one has time for romance. For intimacy. We have a whole service industry springing up because of it. Little slices of the real thing.” Her hands mimic a knife, cutting the air into tinier pieces.
I shrug, and a drop of reminiscence from last night surfaces in my mind. Peacock and I, entwined in each others grasp, drunk and smoldering in the Love Hotel lobby. Going through the selection of rooms. Interstellar. Little Italy. Tropical Paradise. Cottage country. Tiny simulacrums of reality. Your own re-imagined one night honeymoon. Contrast to now. Kozue and I. Bare concrete, a steel door, and a staircase.
What has been more enjoyable?
I decide to tread the waters. “You make it sound like you’ve never been in a relationship.”
“Only fleeting flings. Longest one was when I had an extended stay in New York.”
“Why’d it end?”
Her words chase after a long sigh. “The iron fist of debt brought me back to Tokyo. Might have been something more but it just ended like all the others, finishing before the honeymoon phase did.”
“You mean the cool down? The passion withering away? The fickle arguments?”
“Indeed,” Kozue runs her fingers along the railings. “A shame, really. I feel I’m getting love without all it’s quirky side effects. A romance without the hangover.”
“Consider yourself lucky.” Seriously lucky. Melody punches back into my mind, our final week together was a sizzle reel of fights. I couldn’t help but replay them.
Oh please, Kozue’s face reads. “From the sound of it, Cale, seems like moving halfway across the world hasn’t done much to free your mind from, if I’m taking your implication correctly, ‘the worst relationship in the world’.”
“Almost.”
“Bull–“ She stops, the curse hanging on her tongue. “Pardon my French, but I highly doubt it was all fire and brimstone.”
“Well then, what’s your diagnosis?”
She gives me a look, as if the answer is obvious. “Remember why you first dated her. Look at the positives. Not too long, no need to get attached. But try to realize that it wasn’t a complete waste of your life.”
“The honeymoon phase?”
She shrugs. “I’m sure it wasn’t just then. Even when the passion dies, you get to realize that the person you’re dating is just that. A person. Flaws, quirks, and all. I’m sure even this ex of yours has some redeemable qualities.”
“Even the Peacock?”
“Oh, don’t push it.” Yet her eyes say, yes.
I pause, shaking my head, not sure whether to chuckle or congratulate on half-decent advice “Are you a registered relationship counselor?”
“Part-time.”
“I’ll have to demand proof of certification.”
“It’s back in the room,” she winks. “But, seriously. I have no doubt there was more meaning and more satisfaction in that train wreck of a relationship than whatever superficial small talk you engage with your one night stands.”
“I think simple can be nice sometimes. No obligations, no expectations–”
Kozue’s voice cuts across mine, ghost of a smile upon her face. “I don’t buy it.”
I open my mouth for a reply, but find that it’s glaringly absent. Kozue’s smile expands and I manage to blurt out. “Well, would you say our conversation has been superficial small talk?”
She clicks her tongue, pretending to ponder. “I’d give it a seven out of ten.”
“Surely I can scratch at least an eight.”
“We’re not finished yet.” Kozue deliver the line with an expectation, something to be deciphered. Figured out. There’s a silence between us. She keeps her eyes locked on me but I have to look away.
My watch itches on my wrist. Again, I resist temptation. Kozue’s still there in my left peripheral. Watching, waiting. In my right, flashes glimpses of Melody. Us arguing over something as inconsequential as bowling. Us on the swing set of an elementary school, legs kicking out to the sky. Us laughing over a spilled ice cream cone, two steps from the store. Not all bad. But, look left again, and Kozue blossoms scarlet.
Finally, I speak. “Disclaimer, Kozue, I’m generally a pessimist. I, on all accounts, believe we’ll be stuck here for the rest of our short miserable lives.”
Her look screams ‘are you kidding me?’ “Will we resort to gnawing off our legs for food?”
“Please, I’m a pessimist, not a psychopath. We’ll die of starvation and what not. They’ll find us when we’ve been reduced to damn skeletons.”
“I’ll be sure to be posing funny, at the very least.”
“But, if we do perhaps manage to get out of this,” I pause. Mid-twenties, but my highschool years always return to haunt me. I’m a teenager again, three weeks before prom. “Would you perhaps…like to continue this conversation again, with coffee and in a place with far more comfortable chairs?”
She says nothing for what must be at least a decade, just a hint of a smile teased on the corners of her mouth. Her eyes look down at her viola case for a moment, perhaps consulting it on the matter. Finally, she speaks. “If we go to a Maid Café, so help me...”
“Never in a thousand years!” My face contorts in mock offense “It’ll help cleanse the palate that currently reeks of Peacock.”
She winces. “Better tighten your tongue, buddy. A girl doesn’t like to know she’s a comeback.”
I raise my hands, in a plea for forgiveness. “Got me red handed. It’s all a ploy.”
“Oh shush. But really, I’d have expected the hangover to make you a bit more humble. Not reduced to this…”
“I was never one for strategy. My major was Philosophy.”
“Hence hooking up with the Peacock.”
My hands rise in futile defense. “Oh, says the one who ended up with snap talking cello boy. But, fine, what should I have done?”
“Well, I’d say it’s best to just aim for the prettiest girl in the room.” Her eyes stare past mine. She seems closer than before. Have we moved at all? Is this the hangover playing tricks again?
“That one usually leads to less than ideal situations.”
“I think you just need practice.” Her voice seeps in to my ear like the tide. With her hand, she gestures around the stairwell.“ Look it here. You have a room… and a girl.”
Our eyes still reverberate together. I blink first. “Go for the prettiest girl then?”
A nod and a smile. Nothing more.
I stand up, slowly. Moving to the door, Kozue’s reflection is still smudged upon the steel. I lean down; my lips almost touching the metal as I pretend to kiss mirror-Kozue’s face.. When I turn around, delight bright on my face, real-Kozue’s look may as well be a dagger at my throat.
“Oh, I walked right into that one,” she says.
“Rustier than I thought.”
Kozue rises from the steps, viola dropping beside her. One step. Two steps. And then all I can see is her. There’s a tear shaped flaw in her mascara. “Let me show you then,” she breathes.
Our lips find each other. Traces of strawberry simmer onto my tongue. Kozue’s perfume smells like an orchard of cherry blossoms and apples. The air is now saturated with it. There’s nothing else in the universe but us. My entire body shudders, melts and reforms. I feel a hand wrap around my jacket. My own hand gets lost in a river of black hair, finding the back of her head…
Kozue gives a gasp, a sharp intake of breath. I can feel it. She withdraws her face. “You’re a smoker?”
“Trying to quit.” My lighter is in her hand, red case amidst red nails. “Is that a deal breaker?”
“Nonsense,” she laughs. “This is a means to the end.” And I’m hoping the kiss isn’t included in that statement. My lips still tingle, feeling isolated now, my hand still half raised in the air, clutching invisible hair.
“And what would that be?”
Kozue gives her widest grin yet, pointing for to the door. The sign says what it always has said: ‘In event of fire, door will unlock.’ Then she gestures up to the ceiling. Nailed to it, lies a water sprinkler and a smoke alarm. “I hope you don’t mind soaking that suit jacket of yours.”
“It’s a thrift store find.” I stare in blunt disbelief at Kozue. The lighter, the smoke alarm. So obvious. So blatant, that I’m pretty much expecting another tremendous failure.
For a moment, I’m almost hoping it fails. The kiss is still imprinted on my brain.
From her purse, Kozue pulls out a rat’s nest of paper receipts. Holding them above the lighter, she flicks once. Flicks twice. Spark. Flame. The paper catches, and from it comes the smoke, waxy and charcoal coloured.
It takes about a minute. Kozue and I find ourselves at the door, racers waiting for the gates to come slamming down. She’s bent down and removed her heels. “Hope you don’t mind running,” she says. “Rather not get caught up in some management interrogation.”
“If you trip and fall I’m not going to wait.””
I feel her hand wrapping around mine, fingers entwining. She’s as cool as a alpine stream to touch. “You’ll just have to drag me then.”
“You’ve already convinced me to run, let’s not push it.”
“Perhaps, but maybe there’s another kiss that happens to be waiting outside.” Oh, she’s a devil.
Detonation. A shrieking of alarms. A fountain spray of water. A release our prison unlocks. Kozue and I are through the door, hand in hand. It’s another hallway, seemingly endless, doors flashing by on either side. Kozue and I run and run and run. It’s one of the world’s most underrated sensations, moving swift through a narrow space. The world becomes a blur–merely a spectrum without details–and one feels invincible, like moving at the speed of light.
Glancing right, and there’s Kozue. She’s as clear as daylight. Sprinklers rain down upon us. Water that’s cooler than the arctic. It stings but it reinvigorates. I find myself laughing, and Kozue’s hand tightens on mine. There’s one final door up ahead. It grows bigger and bigger, almost cartoon like. Legs are pounding. I think I hear a voice chase us down the hallway, a shout for us to slow down. But no, what complete nonsense would that be?
***
It’s nearly noon, but Tokyo is a shadow world. High in the sky, the sun is slowly usurped, nearly covered by the black sphere of the moon.
Shibuya is crowded, as it always is. One can’t expect anything less from the world’s busiest intersection. But for once in this city’s lifetime, it is silent. For once, no one moves. All eyes are up to the heavens.
Moon and sun kiss and Kozue’s hand is still tangled in mine. For the first time in twenty minutes, I’m not looking at her. And what a twenty minutes they have been; both of us giddily skipping down the streets of Tokyo, lungs brimming with fresh air, the world thumping to our beat. But now, her hand is enough, her presence a warm glow in this world of strangers.
Closer and closer, the sun and moon flirt, and finally, totality. A moment so rare and entirely too brief. The sun’s corona glistens across the sky, gossamer tendrils of light that dance and sway in a magnificent halo.
A chorus of gasps, all around me, Kozue’s voice is distinct from the rest. We stare as the other’s stare. “Incredible,” she says beside me. As if waiting for an appropriate cue, there’s a ringing. Kozue’s cellphone, freshly charged to an ample five percent from a brief subway visit, now yearns for attention. She plucks it from her bag, before muting it. Some things can wait.
For two minutes and fourty seven seconds, the corona rules over the city. But slowly and inevitably, the moon slips away. Going, going, gone. The sun leaks out slowly, pouring back into the sky and onto the earth. The sky ripens back to a glistening blue.
The world cranks back into the life, and in the space of thirty seconds, people go from mute awe to resuming their regular lives. Kozue takes the opportunity to glance at her cellphone. A single message shines back at her. I watch her expression as she reads it, incandescent and lively as usual. It grows from puzzlement to surprise.
“Don’t tell me it’s that bleached son of a–“
“No,” she says, forgetting to laugh. “It’s the orchestra. They’ve been trying to reach me fore the last two hours, they want to re-audition me. Today.”
“Someone knocked sense into their heads.”
“Blackmail, more likely,” she fires back. “But, they want to meet within the hour.”
“Ahhh.” For that, I have nothing. My hand loosens slightly. “C’est la vie.”
She punches me softly on the shoulder. “Oh, don’t be dramatic. You have a cellphone, yes?”
“No, but I can give you my hostel number.”
“So primeval, and hardly romantic.” She sighs but consents. “Hand it to me.”
I scrawl it on a receipt. “I wouldn’t lose this ticket if I were you.”
“Ticket? What would it be for then?”
I press it into her open palm, our other hands still embracing. “No guarantees…but perhaps an opportunity to escape the honeymoon phase.”
“Okay, then.” It’s a two-word reply, but her smile, as glowing as the sun above us, tells me all I need to know.
Shibuya is back, full salvo. The people line up at every corner of the intersection, waiting for the light. Kozue and I are at the forefront, the street right ahead of us, cars blaring by, our toes teetering on the curb as if about to plunge off the edge of the world.
Green to red. Cars crank to a halt and people pour onto the street in every conceivable direction. Kozue and I steer through the pedestrian traffic, waltzing towards the middle. When we arrive, she does a half turn, facing me. Our lips meet again, and her second kiss is infinitely better than the first, even if it lasts two hours shorter than it needs to be.
When she withdraws, she takes her hand with her. She melts into the crowd, distinct for a moment before pulling away, the riptide of Shibuya sending her off into another direction. I’m alone again.
For now, my grin says, but not forever.
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Post by Matteo ((Taed)) on May 31, 2015 17:12:07 GMT -5
Team Kaez: The gimmick didn't really sell me, but there were still things I liked.
Part of the reason the gimmick didn't work was because I don't think you really engaged with it. If you go high concept, then you need to deliver. You started to tell a romance story that included themes of identity, and discovery, and humanity, but ended up just going for the easy I Love You. And I'm not saying that this had to be a philosophical treatise, or a sci-fi brain-bender, but those themes you started to open up to are actually very relatable, and can be intimately connected with romance. "Her" was a romance movie with a sci-fi gimmick, and it used both together.
Speaking of the easy I Love You: it felt mandatory. I didn't necessarily believe their relationship. And I suppose part of that can be explained as the simple, irrational, love-at-first-sight thing that you were going for, but it would have been nice to see some of what they really felt about each other. Having characters just fawn over one another... it's not entirely unrealistic, real love can certainly be like that to an extent, but there has to be something more to it as well, and I never really saw that here.
Having said that, while the descriptions of the emotions at play got a little on the nose by the end, I actually thought there was some really strong stuff near the start. In particular, the description of Angel wanting to express the immediacy of her love, but believing that she was wrong to do so because "you needed to be in a relationship for a very long while before you could really and properly love someone" was rather excellent. That's a great starting point, and felt like it came from a very honest place. You should have run from that starting point and added more depth than you did, though.
Also, Roseluck is a dumb name.
Team Zovo: All those people are blind now.
This was nice. It had a nice setup, simple but effective, with a lot of subtle elements going for it. The lost soul abroad, the one night stand, being trapped in a confined space; these are all familiar ingredients, but they worked very well together. Especially how kiss became discovery became escape. That was solid. And the solar eclipse tied a nice bow around the whole thing; that's a tricky technique to nail down because it can be so vague, but having a loose goal like that to build to pulls the whole thing together.
The dialogue was ... okay. There were quite a few lines that felt forced, or unnatural, and a lot of the banter was a bit too cute. Likewise, while some of your prose was actually very effective ("a version of me with Sharpied on horns and demon eyes" was quite good), some of it was also too overwrought. I guess it couldn't have been too bad, though, because I still enjoyed the piece. I actually put off reading thing entry until last, because it was so much longer than the others, but it ended up being among the easiest reads of the round. Very good flow, and I didn't find my attention wandering.
Result: Neither of these stories was especially tear-jerking or uplifting, but they both had sweet moments and strong fundamentals. For its great pacing and believable characterization, I'm going to give the match to the story by Team Zovo
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