Chapter Text
To life I offer my quarrelsome view
For I stand at the edge, I’m through.
This is it for me, this is my limit…
Is what I wish I could say.
Yet not a thing remains to benefit
To secure my life from this crying cay
It’s finished.
{ ~ }
20 Days Before the Festival
The Ijichi Nest, STARRY
It’s a cold, lonesome world.
There’s this platonic ideal that many people carry with them – that no matter what, no matter what befalls them, they’ll find a companion to make that arduous path more bearable. It wasn’t a far-fetched concept, as in fairness: how many people were there on Earth? How easy was it to be truly alienated? Even when considering a slim geographical confine, how could one overlook the thousands, tens of thousands, or even millions of lives that flickered around them, caught abridged in the daylight with the sun streaking through them? The glittering sight of all these momentary lives was unmistakable. You couldn’t ignore what your eyes could see. And yet, it was not a matter of personal ignorance, and it may have not even been a matter of ignorance at all; it was something else. Something deeper, perhaps.
Alienation, to be alienated, it was all the result of the errors in societal programming. To throw oneself wholly into the clutches of their malformed civilization was a fool’s gambit destined for failure. There was nothing to be earned by blindly charging into Hades. That sense of belonging would never arrive, not without self-actualization.
Through the haze, a pair of glazed over eyes overlooked a wall of emails, each stacking upon the other to make an impassable barrier, one that – should she have been younger – she would’ve never previously considered surmountable. Her life, however, had changed. Maybe it had changed too early. She’d only recently begun to think at length about it, as she hadn’t had the time before; she’d just been so busy. Day in, day out. Wake up. Check emails. Make sure Nijika was awake, fed, and out the door for school. Call talent agents. Open up the store. Run it until nightfall. Order takeout or eat dinner if Nijika made it. Sleep.
Rinse, repeat. Seika’s routine had more or less been this way; upended only for remodeling, promotions, or holidays; for over ten years. There’d been no room for anything else.
But there had been. In her smallest glimpse of young adulthood, she’d been a right fool. Playing, partying, having fun – she’d wasted her time and money, but it had all been worth it. She was learning. In time, she’d’ve likely learned how to value her time, and value the whimsies within life. A balance would’ve been made. That was, of course, if she had any say in the course of her life. Seika felt alienated. She’d lost her chance at that life… Or rather, she’d surrendered it.
The emails on her laptop’s screen. The notifications that ran screaming through her phone. The memos and notices she got in the mail; it was all business. Nobody invited her to a thing without it being of value to whatever collaboration or promotion was happening at the time. She wasn’t being offered drinks at the bar just to hang out and commemorate life, she was being offered drinks at the bar to talk about tour dates and tourism. She was talking to merchandise companies, producers, and more about t-shirts, album sales, and memorabilia. Where were her casual flings? Her movie dates and her walks in the park? Where went the nights she’d spend drinking in merriment, and the mornings she’d wake with terrible hangovers? All of it mired in the traps of responsibility, Seika’s life was not a life she lived, it was a life she worked.
Her fingers hovered o’er the sable keys of the board from which she plucked a baleful dirge for the life she’d sacrificed. And in her mind crept a withering sentiment, something that sapped the few joys locked away within the folds of her mem’ry, which laid bare a thought that had been buried so deeply that she had forgotten it had ever been there. This thing, this dark soul…
Ice crackled across her spine as ice water spilled through her synapses. It had been buried for a reason. She couldn’t face it then, nor could she face it now. Had the sleepless nights, the tireless days, and the years of hard effort not been enough to stifle this phantom? Her joints clicked as she unbowed her back and leaned up from her hunchback position over her laptop, as she was then filled by a grim apparition of the thing she’d sworn to swallow for her sister’s sake. When people died, the instincts of most were to take care of the children left behind. They were vulnerable. They understood death the least. It was the duty of the support structure around those children to ensure that they could cope.
And so when their mother died, that had become Seika’s job. She took over when she realized their father would not.
But who was there for her? She’d just turned 21. Her entire life was ahead of her, and she had a boundless horizon of choices to pick. And music had been it. She was going to become a famous musician. She’d look over the crowds and see her friends from university, her friends from where she grew up, all of her adoring fans – and then her mom. Smiling. Shining. She’d been there for Seika, and now Seika could give it all back. She could do better than that, even.
It wasn’t fair to say that she was resentful of what happened. It hadn’t exactly been their mother’s choice to die in an accident on her way home, right? It just… sucked. Nobody expects to never be able to see their mom again. They weren’t even allowed to see her before she was interred into the earth; the extent of her injuries had been just that severe. Who chooses that? To be brutalized, to be ripped from the family that needed her – it was a tragedy, plain and simple. Nijika had only been 9 years old. She desperately needed the support that only Seika could provide at the time. Could she have been given up? Sure. But then she’d be making the choice to break their family up more than it had already been irrevocably shattered. It was a choice that Seika had willfully made, then, to raise Nijika and to surrender her dreams.
But she did resent it, didn’t she? She closed her laptop shut with a gentle thud and pushed it to the side, soon coming to rest her face against her hands, as her elbows had been propped up in the newly vacated spot where her laptop once had been. She rubbed her eyes and sighed out a bitter note. The feeling presented itself, clad in blackest ichor, as it rose from the sludge of her deepest melancholy – it was demanding as it stood dauntless in an inversion of heroic valor. That feeling rode along and championed a darker cause; it offered Seika nothing but the sorrow she knew she’d let rot in the depths of her spirit. Oh yes, she resented it.
She hated that she’d given up so much and gained so little. Yes, she had a stable income and a successful business, but those were small things. They were but grains of sand, and were hardly a beach. Life had a pernicious way of being condensed into the most meaningless details, as bad actors across the world attempted to clamber their ways into the hearts of the average person; they all said that wealth was true success, and so they took away the color and the whimsy of life, leaving a person truly bankrupt aside from that which lined their pockets. Seika had money. She was fairly comfortable. The live house didn’t rake in insane amounts of income, but it was more than enough for a single woman who lived on her lonesome. This wasn’t success, though. Where were her friends to celebrate with her? Her family? Even children? She didn’t even know if she wanted children. But most people her age had answered that question already, hadn’t they? Where would she start? Truly, who was she?
Then lifting her head from her hands, Seika regarded the empty void around her with blurry eyes. Ringed by sleep and reddened from irritation, her expression was practically hostile, and yet… Seika just thought to herself that she may need glasses. Was that a result of her lifestyle? She rapidly blinked away the exhaustion and yawned. A long stretch drew a few tears to the corners of her eyes as her poor, woefully underexercised joints popped and creaked. Seika got up. Was she going to work today, then? Would she stew in her bad mood and let herself continue to rot? Maybe she would, but she’d at least try not to while she was thinking about it.
What was she wearing? A hoodie that smelled unwashed and a pair of basketball shorts that were older than STARRY? Yeah, she could do better. Maybe she’d even bathe, not that she was planning on meeting with anyone today.
She didn’t need to meet with anyone to justify making herself feel good. It was somewhat easy to forget that fact – that you weren’t beholden to others in the pursuit of happiness meant you could indulge or, hell, do the bare minimum just for yourself. She climbed the stairs back up to her home. Nijika’s shoes were at the door, and the sight alone made Seika feel a rather cruel nostalgia resonate through her spirit. This sight had become rather scarce. After Nijika began university, she had fewer and fewer reasons to stay at home, and Seika knew that she’d fully move out once she graduated. Kessoku Band barely came around anymore, too. In this trying time, Seika had felt a small joy spark in her heart, born from Nijika’s reliance on her again for emotional support. Soon enough, that would be no more. So yes, it was callous. To feel good about this at all felt almost disgusting. But she wasn’t going to tell anyone, now was she? No, no. That’d be something she could freely take to her grave.
“Oi! Nijika! I’m takin’ a shower!” She yelled out through their flat, and she only heard a fairly small grunt of acknowledgement in return. Poor girl. Seika rolled up her hoodie and tossed it basketball-style into a dirty clothes hamper near her washer-dryer, and she then grabbed a towel and flopped it over her shoulder with a grunt of her own. She then sighed and rubbed her cheek. What could she even say to Nijika? ‘Hitori made her choice, you have to move on’? That just felt so demeaning. It diminished the struggle that Nijika was going through, even if it was mostly true.
She arranged an actual outfit. Slacks to accentuate her legs, of course, and they were black to match the rest, as she picked out an off the shoulder white shirt that she wore over a black tank top. She’d wear her choker, too. It was a classic look for her. There was nothing wrong with the classics!
And so, as she slipped out of her dirty sleeping attire and entered the shower, Seika soon was alone with nothing but the sound of falling water and her solitary thoughts. Warm water washed over her, and it pulled away the malaise of the days preceding. It was as though a stagnant bog was draining of dead, fetid water, to give way to a glistening stream to bring life to a dark and lost place. She ran her hands through her hair, and soon came to grip the long and sunny locks that adorned her head, as she came to array them out in front of herself. She’d worn her hair short as a young woman, hadn’t she?
What changed within her? Surely it wasn’t all just so she could show Nijika how to do her own hair, right? Hadn’t her mom worn her hair short, too? Was this all just a ploy to escape the resemblance?
Seika clenched her fists. Balled up in wet hair, she felt her fingers tingle with an apprehensive fear. She couldn’t remember what her mom looked like.
This was the price, she supposed, for escapism. She let her hair fall down in front of her face and felt the water run down her nose. Had she faced it, perhaps she would’ve known it. Remembered it. To be a memory, it could’ve been so much more — yet she had run from it, buried it so deep that it no longer could bear a face. Her mother was not a nurturing figure in her heart. She had transformed. And like that, Seika acknowledged her deepest alienation; she had been alienated from her love for her own mother, as it was easier to be a stranger than to bear the weight of that sorrow. That grief… it boiled. It blistered her skin and it scalded her throat. It tore out her hair and left her as nothing but a blank, empty shell.
She could’ve broken down, easily. But that wasn’t right, was it now? She looked down at her own body and regarded it with a cold eye. Seika, despite it all, hadn’t let herself go. Her legs were long, shapely, and slender. Her stomach was flat and her arms were far from bulky. She’d ensured that she looked good. Good hygiene, a good diet… she barely drank alcohol and hardly indulged in anything too unhealthy.
To break down now felt like a betrayal of an unspoken pledge. Perhaps she’d never carved it into her heart, but a promise made in silence was still a binding pact, and it wasn’t one she was eager to break. This had been her pledge to Nijika. She’d be an example. Responsible. Healthy. Good looking, if not exactly good natured. Nobody was perfect… She exhaled and relaxed her shoulders. Could she scream her soul out, and leave this small sanctuary with half a heart? Probably. There was no barrier, no wall that barred her way, nor did her life change for the worse if she burned her heart at the stake. That, however, was not her sole consideration. Though her blood pulsed and her muscles ached, Seika felt a deep relief begin to echo outward from an untroubled place — that being the deep soul she’d long held at arms length — as it, in its pristine splendor, radiated with hope.
She had no reason to hope. Perhaps this was a result of her never being able to truly grow up. This lone, solitary whimsy; it was bereft of companions as it surged on with determination.
Surrendering to the currents of fate would be certain failure. Seika finished her shower soon after and exited from her bathroom, her hair all bound up in a towel as it dried. There was a chance that she could improve things, right now. And perhaps, just maybe, that would give her the means to push Nijika down this final stretch. Her baby bird would finally take flight…
Seika Ijichi made a call.
{ ~ }
Their feathers fell light upon me
Carrying my mind, unconscious, away;
My hopes were destined to decay.
It was the others who were meant to be free
Not I – not as I dreamed of vacant laurels –
But they, the colors and the lights,
Who even through their shared quarrels
Managed to line my soul with delights.
When I was apart from them was I at my finest,
But to say I am better without them is truly biased.
{ ~ }
20 Days Before the Festival
On a path of Dionysian libations through Shibuya
Only time passes. The emotions, the feelings constructed from them – those were voyagers on a midnight train, locked into the passenger car for the long haul. Station to station, each of them guests of the pale duke that lorded over the rails, they clutched to their seats without intention; they needn’t make a single move, not until it was their time to go. It took gumption to chase a hitchhiker out of frame. Maybe it was better to leave the freeloader be than to dare upset his unknown mind? And so, what were a few drops of liquid courage as payment to silence those fears, those uncertain concerns that dwelled so unflinching at the back of the mind? Unwarranted things, all. Knock it back, swallow it down: forget. Trap them so they may be barred from the forefront. That had always been the way of the world. People feared themselves, and so instead of living in fear, they instead escaped it and embraced a senseless life through the chorus of things most Bacchanal.
It’s a surface level observation. It didn’t take a smart man to uncover the absolute truth that was found in the fear of confrontation with one’s true self. Nobody liked it. Self growth germinated from a dark place, after all.
Who else was more keenly aware of such things than her? Dionysus, in her insanity, pranced madly as her followers bounded at her heel – each of them swallowed by the fervor of their dance across a world of rejection and shame. The champions of Dimetor knew not of her first coming, but upon her second and most feverish rebirth, they lined the roads in liberty and called her name from the rooftops; their intentions pure as they sought ecstasy born from her lyre. This daughter of Zeus held the attention of the land. She sang a roaring noise and plucked the strings of hypnotic frenzy until those who listened danced themselves to sleep, or to death or worse.
But then Dionysus stopped.
Now she sat at the edge of someone’s fence, with migraine medication in one hand, and a glass of water in the other. She regarded the Sun with a glare one may give an annoying dog. This was the only thing she was allowed to knock back, and so big and gassy butting in like it always did really had a dampening effect on her mood. Not that her mood was great to begin with.
She popped the tablets into her mouth and swallowed a mouthful of water. She let the medication fizzle in her mouth for a few seconds, maybe just to feel something – then it all was washed away. And that was it. With a slowing pulse in both head and heart, she looked out across the street and locked eyes with the park on the other side of the road. Was she even dressed? Who cared? Then clambering from the edge of the porch, she flopped down a few steps and started her walk.
There, she caught her reflection in a puddle of water. The Sun just had to be out today, didn’t it? It couldn’t’ve waited? Just her luck, huh. At least the Sun gave her a good glimpse at herself… and it was a view she wasn’t used to. No vomit streaking down the front of her shirt. Her hair was down, so she hadn’t fallen asleep still with her hair tied up for once. And her face wasn’t red. She looked almost a ghost in her current state; all she needed to complete the look was a grisly wound and some blue-ish lipstick. A sneer crossed her lips as she stabbed a finger at her reflection and asked out loud, “Are ya' me?”
Doubtlessly she was, but there was a growing doubt if that actually meant anything. Who was ‘Kikuri’ without the bluster and the booze? Her fingers twitched.
It wasn’t long ‘til she stood at the last crossing before the park. A pocketful of change weighed heavier than most things in her life, and so as she peered onwards to the park, as she felt a hankering for something – something that she wouldn’t be able to get there. Standing at the mouth of the park was a silvery machine, taller than a man, loaded with drinks; QIRIN plastered in bright red at the bottom of it. Kikuri walked near and smacked a button. Onwards and inwards went in a few coins. A can tumbled to the bottom.
Her throat felt scratchy as she eyed her prize. With trembling hand, she snatched it from the depths of the vending machine, and her fingers hovered over its tab. Swallowing, she gently pried the can open – savoring the crack and the slight spray of liquid as she did. Was it anything like she wanted? No, not particularly, but the motions and the sensation of the process felt good.
Lemon. She smacked her lips and rolled her tongue as if she were a child tasting black licorice for the first time. It wasn’t foamy. It wasn’t heady. It hadn’t the creamy finish nor the buzz that came soon after. No warmth… it was just a can full of liquid. Tart, sweet, but devoid of much other than the almost sandpapery feeling it left in her mouth. Nothing of much merit could be found in it, and she downed the can without much intention on savoring the flavors. CRK. In one motion, she smashed it and flung it with a tump-thump into the waste bin next to the machine. And then she took a long breath. In and out. Like the ebbing of the tides, or the celestial ballet between the Sun and the Moon. This was right.
All wasn’t well, but she had chosen to do the right thing. It screamed within her mind, it caused her skin to be clammy like a fish at a market, and her nails felt like iron spikes as they dragged across her body — the pain pulled her thoughts away from sheer mania. The crucifix her brain was pinned to was a small sacrifice, indeed, when compared to what she could lose, and what she had already nearly lost.
Escapism. She imagined it was the goal of just about anyone to try and escape the material conditions of their reality. Reality left a person rather constrained, after all. With a twist of her neck, she could see a few concrete seats sprouting up from the ground nearby. Since the seats were squarely beneath a pergola, the wooden frame woven with the leaves of orange trees that looked over the top of the latticed open-roof, she felt covered enough from the Sun to rest easily. That, of course, was itself an example of reality’s walls closing in. The Sun was a lifegiving force. Anyone with any sense knew that it caressed the Earth with a velvet touch, as its rays curled around the globe to ensure that the living were warmed and able. How could she possibly be aggrieved by such a radiant being? And yet… she was annoyed by it. It seared into her vision and left spots, and it burned her pale flesh like how fire easily scorched paper to a crackling crisp. She could escape into the poetic world, to regard the Sun as a celestial Madonna which birthed all the world, and still be reminded of the bare reality.
It was an incandescent, gargantuan thing of boundless energy and apathetic heat. It did not give life, it did not shape a thing; it simply was — that was no mother, nor a God, it was an illusion of love — and it simply roared. And she, Kikuri, was but a sack of bones and meat that had an overt dependence on a thing she was now depriving herself of.
She could escape into whimsy and see herself as a fae trickster, plucking her fiddle as she fooled the world and danced dangerously through it; she would still have to face her failing health and broken heart.
Her hands were shaking. They were cold.
There was no recourse for this. All that was left was to face it, and yet she couldn’t muster the courage. She laughed in a bitter way, then taking a seat beneath the orange trees and the pergola, as a dusting of dappled light shone down upon her. What would she be without this cyclical nature? Her highs and lows, her mania channeled through booze; it’d all proved to be the perfect conduit for her musical style. And sure, she didn’t have any money… and surer still, she had few good relationships. But what if she was true to herself? What if she actually unveiled the real person behind the mess, the mayhem?
She knew what they’d see. They’d see a lot of scars, unhealable. To be Kikuri was to be broken in absolution. The childhood remembered in fragments and fear. The adolescence best forgotten as it is a monument of desire tangled with the soul’s pain. And now the adulthood, a life lived astray. None of these parts interlocked into a whole, as the whole was a monster, and something best left unhatched. She plucked shards of the shell from her skin, and stared onwards at life with fledgling eyes; she had yet to take flight, and yet she feared the ground. A gust flowed through her hair in tangles, and she felt a lifelong chill shiver through her bones; the stark awareness of her fate being something she could never truly escape. To an ocean is water justified, as doom is to her. A fool would’ve closed their eyes to the truth that lay at destiny’s end, but she was no fool – that would’ve required her to not have the wherewithal to drown her senses in the bottle.
Doomed by the narrative. She chuckled as she swept a loose strand of hair away from her eyes, her hand lingering over her ear as she listened to the leaves rustling in the wind. There was another sound mixed in there. The crunch of gravel – footsteps approached at a measured pace. Whoever it was, they chose not to speak. Not yet. They appreciated the quiet calm, and possibly were even drinking in this quiet closeness. A meager distance between them, the other person had chosen to seat themselves on the other concrete seat; the two of them shared the canopy of the mandarin trees.
A leaf flittered down, the wind’s eddies pulling it down in a gentle spiral. A pale, lithe hand deftly picked it from the current and folded it between outstretched fingers. Then a sigh soon followed. “Hiroi. I half expected to see you swaying with the wind. But you look… awake.”
Kikuri didn’t need to turn her head. The speaker was familiar to her, after all. She rested her elbows against her knees and crossed her arms by her wrists. Hands left dangling, the wind grazed her skin – thus, she became ever so aware of the chill that had settled into her body. The booze had been more than a mere method of achieving escape. It had been the lone, solitary fire that’d kept her warm, that’d kept her sane.
Who else would be looking for her, other than Shima Iwashita? The indefatigable drummer of SICK HACK, she’d been the dogged pursuant of ensuring that the band did not disintegrate beneath the weight of Kikuri’s own errant nature, and their guitarist, Eliza’s, spontaneous energy. A marching beat just narrowly kept these women in line, and Shima was the one who’d been chosen as the one to drum it out.
“I’ve been going around asking myself ‘how am I going to find this bastard’ for a few days now. I even stopped by a fortune stall along the way, and when the Tower got pulled, I started to wonder if I was going to find you dead in a ditch. It would’ve explained a lot. The missed calls. Ditching an entire set. We’re in the red, you know? Deep in it. Your debts, having to refund tickets… I almost feel like if you had died, it would’ve been better.” Her contempt was thinly veiled. In that even cadence she always took, she dished out words that one may expect to be conveyed to utter human trash. And yet, just as the Sun’s light still shone through the partially transparent skin of the leaf in her hands, you could hear something in her tone shift; her words like the veins of the leaf. “...the Fool’s journey, however, isn’t over. I’m relieved by that.”
“Ya’ sure about that? Didn’t sound like it.” Her own voice was softer than she’d expected it to come out. Kikuri rather misliked this feeling, and yearned to escape it. Yet, she needed to be strong.
“Would you prefer that I lied, Hiroi? We live in a world of cause and effect. What you did has consequences. But, consequentially, I’m not really thinking about them right now.” Shima must’ve stood up by the sound of the gravel shifting. A few footsteps carried her in front of Kikuri, though for the moment, all Kikuri saw were a pair of white high-tops.
“Hello, Shoema.” Kikuri wiggled her fingers at Shima’s shoes.
That got a grumble out of the self-serious drummer. She then asked, “So, where have you been? I only knew that you were here because Kazama said you were sleeping over. Nice girl. Too nice for you.”
Kikuri snorted. “Everyone’s too nice for me.”
“True enough. Are you going to answer my question?” She pressed.
Waving her arm, Kikuri retorted with an almost cat-like yowl, “Iunno! Am I in a fuckin’ interrogation? Give me a damn minute. I was really enjoyin’ my peace and quiet.”
A lie so blatant that it drove Shima to kneel down just so she could look Kikuri in the eyes. That insufferably cool face of Shima’s, that insufferably responsible look in those red eyes of her’s… they’d broken for genuine concern. There’s no chance, not born of any place on this mortal Earth, that Kikuri could possibly find peace in the silence.
And Kikuri wasn’t stupid. She knew that this was going to lead to more prodding. So, as she lifted her head from her slouched position, she knew with resignation that she’d have to spill the beans. Shima deserved it, at least. “Okay, okay… guess I shouldn’t keep this bottled up. Feh… that’d almost be funny if I meant it to be a joke. Sadly, I’m no wordsmith on this miserly Tuesday. Not only am I not hungover, not only am I not sore from celebration, I don’t have a line of petitioners following me trying to haggle me for the yen I owe them. What would you like to hear, Shima? Wouldja like to hear that I’ve gone straight edge, that I’ve finally decided to be responsible? Or wouldja like to hear the truth?”
“A responsible version of you sounds like a fever dream.” Shima noted with a dispassionate veneer.
“Yeah, she’s not here right now. I was wearin’ her like a glove for a few days ‘coz I felt like I owed it to those girls. Ain’t normal for people to rely on me not named ‘Shima’ or ‘Eliza’, gonna be honest. When those girlies started poppin’ up in my frame of view I started to feel my heart beat out a different pattern. Took me a long while to start respectin’ that they looked up to me, despite my… me-ness. Shit, have you ever heard me talk about my problems? You’re always tellin’ me about my own problems since I’m usually blind to ‘em since I’m drowning in a caramel-colored pool.” Kikuri rubbed at the back of her tattooed hand. “But I was content with it, I guess. Maybe I didn’t know how to be disenfranchised. I didn’t even know that I already was. Who am I, really? Is it a question you ever think about?”
Shima’s quiet for a long time. Between them, for a time, did only the sound of rustling leaves and the low din of Tokyo’s hustle and bustle play out. In the margins were just the sounds of honking horns, industrial clangs, and the cacophony of voices that formed no words, but only a low roar. The pounding heart of humanity was vital in your ears in this sort of place, even in the most peaceful of its many corners. Shouts and jeers and cries, they all were mush. The individual face sank below the collective static.
Kikuri idly dredged up her memories, or lack thereof, from the past few years. She remembered camping with Shima and Eliza, she remembered the time that that SIDEROS drummer got Shima deep into rhythm games, she remembered each time she’d been scolded for bad behavior… but she didn’t recall the days she drank. The partying — it was all empty space. Only disapproval lingered in the hollow, a bitter sense that someone had given up on her.
Memory is infinite. Yet, her memory had clear limits. Really, who was she?
A slow exhale keyed Kikuri into the fact that Shima was about to speak. The words had found their footing in the minutes that’d come and passed in the meantime, though there was clearly no indication that they were going to be right. Shima’s voice came slowly, “…Do you even remember how we met?”
“And no, I don’t mean whatever horseshit your mind concocted in its addled state. I really want you to think about it.” Was it unfair to assume that Kikuri had forgotten? No… but it stung to hear Shima say it. “Forget the fantasies and the delusions. What do you actually know?”
Kikuri looked down and to the side. “…I thought you were a badass. My little heart wanted to jump free and start banging on your kit, but I managed to choke that down with all the other rancid shit festering in my gut because I needed you. That what you wanna hear, huh? I was never responsible. I was a shy, chickenshit, lost girl who needed the hot, confident bitch do everything for her. Yeah, I remember it crystalline. That was the most important event in my entire life.”
“But it wasn’t.” Shima just had to make a point. A good one, too. “You’re leaving yourself out of the big picture.”
“Do I have to pay for this sesh, Doc? I’d be going to therapy if it was free.” A bold faced lie, but it was the kind of lie she made freely, assuming that it’d either rule Shima up, or get her to laugh. Anything to loosen her up, Kikuri supposed.
“The debt you owe me is tremendous. But 500 yen and we’re even. I want something to drink.” To note, there wasn’t a lick of expectation in her tone of voice. She fully expected Kikuri to have no money. After all, how could someone with cash in her wallet be so deeply, desperately in the red like she was? Expectations set so low, she genuinely gasped when Kikuri pressed a few coins into her palm.
With a sharp grin, the founder of SICK HACK said, “It’s my treat. You’re gonna get a lollipop if the good behavior keeps up. Good girls get rewarded.”
“Fuck off.” Shima marched off the vending machines, grumbling and functionally growling below her breath.
She came back after a short while. She downed a cheap canned coffee after a few gulps, and without missing a beat, regarded Kikuri with that ever so hawkish glare. “I remember you perfectly from school, Hiroi. You never fit in anywhere. Everyone thought you were closer to an urban legend than a real person. A moaning ghost in our toilets who ate behind dumpsters and somehow, despite not doing track nor field, could sprint out the door faster than the human eye could track. People had you squared as a freak.”
“Don’t think it was because I was weird.” Kikuri had grown frighteningly still, her voice low.
Shima looked to the side. “No, I guess not. An eccentric person tends to be overlooked after a certain point in time.”
“Yeah. Society’s got a mean way of chewing up and spitting out the folks that don’t quite fit into ‘drab and grey’. But I made the biggest mistake any single person could make… I made my identity important. Her hands are too big. She’s got too much hair. She looks at me weird. Do you think he’s just growing his hair out to stare at us in the showers?” Kikuri dragged her fingers across her arm, leaving a white streak in their wake. The trail of her fingers soon turned red and angry.
“Something was broken. I was an error. The machine couldn’t chew me up, so it choked on me.” Kikuri didn’t move. The world spiraled around her without any input on her behalf. In the center of the storm, she clasped her hands together and noticed just how thin they’d become. A far cry from the hands she’d once hated. So thick, so crude… She slid her palms against each other and let her arms settle back against her knees. “It’s proof that I never had an answer. Who am I? Not who I was born as, not who am I now… I’m nobody. I’m the lost heroine, gone off to thunder, who’s lost her sword and her shield, and can’t even think about betrayin’ the Gods. Yet my life’s still pushin’ on. I’m barely holding onto it. Shit, am I even lost? Or am I where I’m meant to be, and this is all just… what I deserve? I played mediocre bass in a school band and got it in my head that I shoulda been respected for it. I walked up to you like makin’ SICK HACK was like signin’ a contract into universal law. I played games with hearts, and won stupid ass prizes for it.”
A sharp, sleek grin passed over her face; there was a certain satisfaction she felt from dismantling her own will. Perhaps, intrinsically, she knew that she wasn’t worth much in the grand scheme of things, or worse: she was simply paying penance for past wrongs. Self-sustaining wrongs. She pushed her words through those toothy knives as if they were bile spilling up from her throat, “I had chances to get anything I ever wanted. I coulda had more. A lot more. But I chose the bottle ‘coz it beat me senseless enough to not care anymore.”
Kikuri breathed out through her nose and shook her head slowly. Her voice stooped low, “I made us popular, but I didn’t make us rich. Ain’t gold that decides fortune, but even if gold were the lone judge, we’d still be shit out of fortune. The grief’s not worth it. You coulda been happy in some local band, enjoyin’ your peace. She coulda–”
“I’m stopping you there,” Shima’s voice was closer than before. She hadn’t noticed her come close, as she’d turned her attention far away from the physical as she’d launched into her tirade. But there she was. That knife’s sharp expression of hers softened on contact with Kikuri’s own, as the corners of Kikuri’s eyes welled with bitter tears. She took Kikuri’s right hand and circled her thumb around the tattoo on its back. She continued to speak, “This self-loathing thing doesn’t suit you. I know it’s why you drink, but it’s also really annoying. Shut up and let me take over, okay? I don’t want to have to repeat myself. It’s not because you're not worth it, but because if I have to repeat myself, I don’t think I’ll get the chance to. What happened? You didn’t tell either Eliza or me about why you suddenly quit the bottle. And usually, I’d be supportive about that kind of thing, but with you? Fat chance. You’re giving it to me straight, or else I’ll drag you home.”
Kikuri waved Shima off with her free hand. “Haaaah… I was going to spin some bullshit but I figure there’s no point, is there? We’re talking real. Ain’t nothing more real than this. Maybe you’ve noticed, maybe you haven’t, but there’s a ‘lil flock of girlies that look up to me. I couldn’t tell ya’ why they do, just that they do. You’ve had to deal with Yoyo and her magical troupe of ‘We’re-Friends-But-We-Can’t-Hang’ pals, but there’s also… a fleeting life form. Like an orphaned kitten that’s been kept out in the rain. So sickly and stick-thin, just me holding her in my hands brought the warmth back to her.”
“Sh-she’s a damn good kid. She’s just like me. The whole world’s in her hands…” Kikuri’s voice became heavier as she spoke, as it was laden with a blubbering kind of sorrow. She couldn’t stop the tears, nor would she. It was just the kind of sadness that rained forth without care. There was no social dignity nor practiced boundary that could’ve ever stopped the downpour as it came, as Kikuri was forced to tap into this feeling – that thing that had coiled feverishly around her heart and driven her to this far-from-ideal end. Kikuri rocked back and forth as she tried, and failed, to keep her composure. “She thought she’d be loved because she’s good at what she does. But the love… it couldn’t get through to her. The cold had soaked in too deep. It was a matter of time before she’d quit this mortal coil, wrapped in angel feathers, stolen from us because she lost the means to dream.”
Kikuri clutched her arms to her chest. As she wanted to fall, to sink into her despair, she was only kept from the ground by a strong embrace. Shima held her up, though she didn’t stop her – that was not her place to intervene in. She had to listen; she’d promised to. Kikuri’s voice became so quiet, “This is why I don’t get too close to people. This is why I escape the way I do. It hurts too much. Burned too many times. And I’m still burning..”
“Shima... Shima? It hurts, Shima.” Kikuri curled even further inwards. “I can’t get it outta my head. Those eyes… He’s still pitying me. She’s still pitying me…”
“But I’m not.” Shima firmly held on. “This is your life and this is how you’ve chosen to live it. Do you know what this moment is? You might feel like you’ve fallen. And in truth, you have – that doesn’t mean that you stay down. Are you dead? If I haven’t killed you, and your liver hasn’t given out… the signs are that you’re still in the game. I’m not ordering you to suck it up and get back on your feet. You made a choice to be responsible for them. You go back to that bottle, and who says that you won’t be paying for Hitori’s life?”
Kikuri jerked out of Shima’s grip and almost fell from the stool, flat on her back. She caught herself with her hands and failed to feel the gravel cut into her palms, as all she could do was look on, incredulous, as she realized that Shima had known the truth all along. Betrayal? No, that’d be too much. Was it just shock, then, that she’d been played? Kikuri… laughed. Shima hovered a few steps away, her hands outstretched as she was moving to help Kikuri to her feet, now paused as she had no idea how to react to laughter of all things. It started small and grew. It bubbled upwards like a renewed desert spring, as the fountain of life now spilled out across what was once desolate and bare. When it became a full belly laugh, as she wiped tears from her eyes, Kikuri’s almost manic mirth made Shima feel as though her friend had lost her mind. But it began to die down as soon as it had soared. Kikuri’s laughs petered out. “Of course you knew. Who’da believed that I managed to keep somethin’ from your impeccable eye? Fair’s fair. You got me.”
Kikuri got up on her own. She looked down at her palms and stared at the nice new cuts that’d formed on them. She huffed out a small breath and looked back up to Shima. “That’s why you asked me about how we met, huh?”
“I knew.” Shima shoved her hands in her pockets, and then turned her face away with a stormy look.
“Yeah…” Kikuri flashed a sharp smile. “You did.”
“So… I’d be failin’ that young, still hopeful me just as much as I’d be failing Hitori-chan…” Kikuri rubbed at the back of her neck, the feeling of it on her still raw palm making her lightly wince. She removed her hand and mirrored Shima, straight into the pockets they both went! It was somewhat shameful to still need this guiding hand – to need this push towards the answers that she should've known, it was just another sign of her lack of growth. She said just now that she’d be failing her younger self, but in truth, she already had. She’d failed that version of herself continuously for a decade now. Should she be disappointed by that? In some way, she felt like she’d already come to terms with that failure. So perhaps that sense of disappointment had long drowned, and it had done so alongside many other feelings that she should’ve properly delved into with a sober mind. Yet, that was ‘should have’. In the past, it was behind her; there was nothing to be gained if she remained in that state of mind.
What was ahead of her, then? She couldn’t imagine falling further, as that’d imply there was anything deeper than Tartarus. A victim of eternal suffering she wasn’t, and so she looked up from the deepest, blackest pit of all creation, and sighed through her nose. The jitters, the bad thoughts, the years and years of unresolved issues… they were necessary. Kikuri was not her own person, as nobody lived free of a world of consequences.
“Gotcha, gotcha. But really, Shima? You want me to stir up more trouble than I already have? You’ve really taken to my daredevil’s spirit.” Kikuri sneered at her friend, who stared at her with that same even glare that she always offered.
Her brows softened for a second before furrowing even deeper. “Shut up. Let’s get something for your hands and then hit the road. Shimokitazawa sound good to you?”
That name echoed through her head like a call to prayer. It rang sonorous throughout the far reaches of her empty heart, and it brought more than a filling sensation. What came to engorge the vessel then spidered through the whole of her; it metastasized into a true malignancy.
Anticipation. Dread. Fear. All of the faces that she’d been blind to as she swallowed nocturne and embraced the night. But now she had to face the sunrise. A new day, a new dysfunction. But she had to. So, in lieu of letting her fear loose, Kikuri did what she did best. She put on an act. Like she was slipping into a dress fitted to her every curve, she donned her heroine’s mask and wore the devil’s own smirk. “Shit, we’re going now?”
{ ~ }
So then my spirit weighed heavy,
Lower’d by their spiritual wings
These senses and these feelings bursting the levy
Of my core self: the inner world;
Run o’er by the darkness that such a feeling brings –
A rush, a mania, a terror that grips –
That which outstrips had finally unfurled
Here I am, Stargazer, shadowed by the eclipse
To my mother I send my bloodied heart
And to my father, I am thankful for my art.
{ ~ }
20 Days Before the Festival
Kichijoji Station
A loathsome chill spilled out from the crown of heaven and blanketed the world in frost. The Sun brought a heat that failed to reach those locked in the heavenly cold, as though the land below the sky remained in motion, to be made aware of this deep freeze was to be taken away from the natural order of things. There was a certain pernicious element to it, in how it seeped so thoroughly into the core of her bones. Would she feel the same way if she’d been submerged in water? Her legs felt waterlogged as she trudged through the world bathed by sunlight – that radiance didn’t touch her.
What an odd sensation that was. To be physically present in the same space as a thousand others, with no ailment to her name other than the shadows of her mind, yet she felt the tundra’s call cry over the reality of the Sun’s blistering authority. The void of personhood yawned ‘neath the pavement, and it spread yonder with each passing step.
The great eclipse still hovered o’er her, in its shadow was the world captured in a rapturous pause. She breathed in, and then she breathed out. A measured exhale. Seika was jostled back into the real world by her train coming to a stop.
Eyes overcast, she stared out at the open platform, peering easily through the throngs of rabble that roused around her. It was easy to sift by height, hair color, and the color of coats. But, as they lived in a land where people mostly had straight black hair, the brownish-red head that poked out of the crowd was incredibly easy to see – that and the white coat, who wears a white coat? Her mind had wandered in the hours prior; who did she want – no, need – to see? A few faces and names bounced through her thoughts until she landed on a person whom she knew would keep her straight and steady, as this was a person who’d never let her get away with anything… anything but sleeping on her couch, maybe. But that was a long time ago.
“Seiiiiiiikaaaa!” A hand shot up. “There you are!”
Seika filed away her inner dialogue for a later date, as more pressing matters now laid in her path. She waved back and put a hand up to her mouth, “I see you! I’m heading over!”
She ducked and weaved through the foot traffic, never once bumping or even brushing into another person, though they definitely did move out of her way. Never her for them. What else could she do but shrug that off? Maybe she just got lucky.
“What’s gotten into you, huh? You look like you could bite the head off of any man within a twelve kilometer radius and feel NOTHING about it.” Face to face, Seika felt her frigid heart somewhat thaw at the sight of a dear friend – it was Rina, an ex-bandmate of hers that’d remained in contact over the years, as she was one of the rare sorts who didn’t view Seika as a meal ticket or a business opportunity. They’d just diverged paths, that was all. But, what Rina said… Seika cocked her head.
Rina brought a hand to her mouth and laughed, it was an airy, almost fluted noise. It was a far cry from Seika’s own ‘sounds like if steel cables had a voice’ tone of speaking. Rina said, “Classic Ijichi. You don’t even know when you’re glowering something fierce.”
“Glowering? This is just what I look like.” Resting bitch face couldn’t compete with Seika’s resting ‘knife murderer’ face. Though, she did feel some of the tension in her facial muscles. Maybe she didn’t actually naturally look this way. Still, it’s what she presented, and little was going to sway that rather thorny exterior of hers.
“Suuuure. You used to smile quite a bit! But don’t believe me, it’s not like I’ve known you for what feels like a lifetime — nope, nah, nadda… those memories? False!” Rina pivoted and started walking away from Seika.
Seika blinked. She should probably follow along, then. Then rubbing at her neck, Seika grumbled beneath her breath, “What a pain…”
Trying to keep ahead of the crowd was a bit of a chore, but it wasn’t anything either woman was unused to. If you live in Tokyo long enough, you become used to the human cornucopia — there’ll always be some kind of fruit spilling out. Given that Seika can’t even remember the last time she’d been out of town, it’d somehow probably be harder for her to manage in a countryside town than in the midst of the swarms that mobbed 14 million strong Tokyo. They were out of Kichijoji Station in minutes. Their destination was so close that they had clear vision of it — there was only a plaza in the way — but Rina took a slight detour. Seika dutifully followed along.
It was a little ways down the street. Parked at the side of it was a black van, ornamented by thick lines and letters that read out some name in a language Seika didn’t understand. If she remembered correctly, it was Cyrilic: the alphabet the Russians used. A bold flourish for a bold nature. Rina had a knack for those kinds of odd, yet decidedly attractive, artistic choices.
Two men loitered by the side of the truck. One of them, a scruffy looking guy in street wear, offered a small wave when he spotted Rina. The more boyish sort at his side bounded over. A foreigner, by the look of him. Those kinds of square facial features were out of place in Japan.
His accent was at least pretty good. “Welcome back, Rina-san! Who is this? Is this the lady you spoke about on the way?”
Seika folded her arms. His actual word choice was stilted. So long as they didn’t have him as the frontman, she didn’t see how it could be an issue, aside from interviews – that said, so long as they didn’t have a Hitori Gotoh in the ensemble, interviews were at least salvageable. That feeling kind of slapped her in the face. Even though it was true, was it right of her to think about Hitori that way? She stood still a ways away from the chattering bandmen, as they regaled each other on subjects that were clearly familiar and well-trodden. Seika’s name came up a few times. She didn’t listen to what they were saying about her. Knowing Rina, her abandonment of her old band over a decade ago probably was a hot topic.
Rina only held onto that grudge because she thought it was funny, or at least Seika hoped so. It’d be surprising for such a headstrong woman like her to actually hold onto such petty little problems for so long. Then again, Seika was still thinking about it herself. Projection was a possibility. She couldn’t exactly put it past herself, given her own lack of emotional comprehension.
Eventually, the time came for her to be roped into the little pow-wow going on by the van. There was a third bandmate, a darker skinned girl with curly hair, behind the wheel of the van – she’d poked her head out of the window to give the others a shout. Parking on Kichijoji Street, right in front of the station, was going to get them in trouble ere long. So, she had to find an actual place to park. That had her wheel off, with the scruffy looking bandman in tow. Which, of course, left Rina, herself, and the boyish foreigner. Rina was at least mirthful despite the clear annoyance in her cocked hip and tapping foot, as she half-laughed out, “You idiots. Why didn’t you park while I was inside of the station?”
The boyish bandman shrugged his shoulders. “It did not occur to Nana-san. She said, as we parked at the curbside, that ‘Gosh, d’ya have to overthink everythiiiiing, Sevaaaa-kun’, and so I chose not to further belabor the point.”
Seika grumbled to herself, “Does this kid only know how to speak in polite speech?”
“Ahaha… we’ve been working on it. Seva learned most of what he knows of Japanese from his old captain, and well…” Rina trailed off, as within seconds, ‘Seva’ snapped into a crisp salute.
He said with a boisterous spirit, “The finest kickers this side of the Urals! Nobody counts out the Kostroma Crows until the last straw burns!”
His shouting had Seika cover her face. She wasn’t here, she wasn’t affiliated with this man — then she spotted the crowd of onlookers that were staring at him like he was a beast. Their eyes trailed over to her, and she felt a cold sweat start to form on her neck. Her mind begged them to understand they weren’t here together…
But they were. So, Seika swallowed her dwindling social pride, and chopped Seva on the back of the head. “You moron! What’re you doing shouting like that?”
“Ack! Is your friend a kung-fu master?” The Russian’s sparkling blue eyes sought Rina in hopes to be saved, but he realized that he’d now inadvertently summoned a second demon. Maybe a greater demon than the first…
“Kung-fu isn’t even Japanese; you’ve learned nothing! What have you been doing with the books we’ve been giving you?!” Rina shoved right past Seika, and with a heavy huff, she grabbed Seva by his collar. A part of Seika now felt a smidgen of remorse for the guy, but at the same time, it did sort of feel like this wasn’t new behavior for him.
As Rina shook Seva like you’re not supposed to shake a baby, Seika felt a thought hit the back of her mind. He said the driver was ‘Nana’, right? If she recalled rightly, that’d actually be ‘NahNah’, the stage name of a certain Naoko Nakatani. She used to sing for a rock band — Shojo Knives? That’s their singer. Rina’s on drums… and the scruffy guy, Seika realized that she kinda sorta recognized him. He was playing by the Shimokita station a few months back, right. And he was collecting tips in a guitar case…
Could it be?
B-b-bassist?!
That cold sweat became a fully blown shiver from the depths of Hell. It truly is a universal constant. No matter what, no matter where, bassists were evil.
She sighed a sigh of relief that she hadn’t picked one up, herself. A mediocre guitarist was still scum, but they had some measure of dignity compared to whatever was going on with that species of creature; they didn’t even want to pretend to wear human skin. It was all vibes and attitude — no brain cells or common sense to be found within their expansive minds.
That had her frowning. To be honest, maybe that was all a bit overblown; though, why did she even think to second guess that instinct in the first place — hell, she’s had Nijika running around warning people about the ‘Three Bs’ even before Nijika started playing on a legitimate drum kit! That wriggling sensation she was feeling earlier this day started to creep back in — that alienation. Where did this sentiment even come from? Why did she see herself as some kind of authority on music when she’d dropped out of that game a lifetime ago?
Did she dare seek it out? What was casting this deep, foreboding shadow over her thoughts?
She shook her head and grabbed Rina and Seva by their scruffs. Boss-lady time. “Are you a circus act or something? This clown-show’s over; either you straighten up or I’m going ahead on my own.”
“What kind of threat is that?” Rina leveled a flat stare at Seika.
Seva crossed his arms and nodded. “Mm, mm! We would be here with or without you. You are like a stray cat!”
“C-can it!” She let go of them both. Seva fell on his ass, while Rina just rubbed her neck — the red mark of being held by her shirt was clear on her skin. Seika huffed and puffed. “There’s no way I’m here because I want to be. You needed me here. Your vocalist doesn’t know how to park, your bassist can’t speak normally, and your guitarist wears a beanie.”
“Yeah he’s too mid thirties for that…” Rina said thoughtfully, nodding along with what Seika said. She caught herself just going along with things, and so mid nod she snapped into a rather aggressive pose, her pointer finger now stabbed Seika’s way. “But! You literally called me to hang out! How can you be this tsun? You’re too almost-mid thirties for this!”
A sword straight through the back. Seika almost buckled under the weight of the deathblow, but with how much of a beating her pride had already taken, she yet found the courage to stand. “I just knew I was needed.”
“Bullshit. You’re having a sad girl day. Most of us get this out of our systems by twenty five, but I guess you skipped ahead of us to do your live house stuff. Fine! Fine. Yeah, I need you here. Is that enough to keep you from bursting into flames?” Rina threw her hands up. “Can we just please go to the Sunroad now? I’m hungry, our show’s in six, er – five hours, and I wanna screw around in some of the shops.”
Seva looked at Seika with those glittering eyes of his, and with Rina fuming like she was, Seika felt the brunt of their expectations fall into her fresh wounds like they were salt. The burning sensation got her going. She clenched her jaw, scrunched up her nose, and even closed her eyes – all just so that she’d nod, anyways. “Hanging in Kichijoji… haven’t done that in a while. Fine. Let’s go in. If you ask me to play darts anywhere, I am absolutely going to kill you both.”
The Russian’s back went straight as a rail upon hearing that. He still wasn’t quite sure if Seika was some kind of secret martial arts master, or a kind of assassin. If he said ninja, would that still be insensitive? Rina side-eyed him long enough to give him the impression to not say a single thing, and so he didn’t. It may have been the first smart thing he’d done since coming over to Japan on a work visa. Rina, to her credit, didn’t needle him about whatever strange thoughts were now blooming in his head – instead, she punched a fist into her palm and grinned. Competition. Now that’s nostalgic. She and Seika hadn’t butted heads like this since they were still in school, but they used to absolutely tear up clubs when they needed a sacrificial lamb for their silly little contests. The score, if she remembered it through the alcohol and wild lifestyle, was surprisingly even. An idiot like Seika should’ve never been able to keep up.
Rina’s grin, fueled by memories of her youth, softened into something more mature. An idiot like Seika also should’ve never been responsible enough to open a business, especially not for another person. It would seem, then, that Seika had given up the mantle of idiot; though she may still be scum of a certain variety, it was a type of scum that at least cared for others, and had some semblance of a life figured out for themselves. A manager was scum, but a manager at least had a semi-stable income.
Not really applicable in Rina’s case, that. She beckoned with a tilt of her head, her smile still present, as she felt a growing desire to see more of Seika. The feckless guitarist who had to repeat university twice was a far cry from this grown ass woman that now strided ahead of Rina, her head held much higher than it ever should’ve been.
Why had she even called her? They were so distant from each other that the light of their stars barely reached one another. One of them was still playing in indie circles without a single major success. The other had a home, a business, and served as a platform to give a voice to several rising stars – Kessoku Band chiefly among them. Was Seika clutching to this youthful nostalgia, just like she was? Frankly, it just made her feel old. Her early thirties were hardly the time to start feeling ancient, but when your own folklore was so dead and buried, it was hard not to feel a certain kind of way about it all.
Isn’t that a pity? To think that they come so close to understanding…
Seika leads the pack towards the Sunroad. As for shopping experiences go, Kichijoji had one of Japan’s more memorable ones. A covered walkway, it was lined with storefronts and shopping complexes, and made for a surprisingly comfortable outdoor shopping experience. Even as the midsummer Sun beared down on them, being sheltered from those scorching rays by the Sunroad’s cover was a definite plus.
Though she was not one to extoll the virtues of something designed to leech her money from her, she felt as though Kichijoji held one of the few genuinely ‘enjoyable’ shopping experiences within Tokyo. Then again, she wasn’t one to regularly make shopping runs aside from popping into a konbini here or there, so maybe she wasn’t the best person to make such a judgement. All the same, it dragged her mind kicking and screaming back to the past. The cafes, the ramen shops, the foreign import clothing shops, even the ROUND101. She could practically imagine drinking cola, playing billiards, and losing miserably to…
She smiled. Nobody could see it, but it was there. That small crack through the glacial ice had to mean something.
The trio eventually returned to a quintet, as the scruffy bandman and the gal vocalist caught up to them, and Seika lost herself to the whims of the group. They got coffee. They popped into a drug store. The Russian bought himself something to remind him of home, and of course it was a nice bottle of vodka. Seika was caught off guard by her ability to keep up with a conversation about strumming patterns and fretting – that was equally matched by her being surprised that she knew more than the actual guitarist in their little convoy. They sat to eat at some faux-Italian restaurant with a silly name, and as the hours began to fade into one another, Seika had a moment of great pause.
This band had to play in about an hour, and aside from Rina, they’d all departed after they’d finished filling up on carbs and tomato sauce. The two of them were pitched up in a shop that’s specialty was all tights and leggings, and Seika found herself peering down at a very familiar looking pattern of black and white stripes. Her fingers reflexively found themselves curling around the edges of the tights. Did that mean she was thinking about matching her tights to her pants? No, not particularly. The sight was just stirring, as had been her day in Kichijoji. Would that it had been so clear to her before, she may have avoided so many years of strife – perhaps she could’ve freed herself from this alien orbit and finally landed back home in Japan, where she belonged. Because, and of course it was true, she missed this. She had never seen herself as a loner. She simply had become one by necessity. So this star had fallen into her orbit, and she called upon it; she hoped that Rina could’ve been the cure to her rather Martian condition. Yet now she stood upon the surface of the Earth and still felt a calling deeper within.
These memories of Kichijoji weren’t ones she’d shared with her old band. They’d been with her mother. And worse, they’d been with her.
Thwap!
Seika jumped out of her skin and rocketed through the ceiling. A voice behind her practically chittered with glee as she said, “You can’t be serious in thinking you still fit in that size.”
Coming down from the high heavens, covered in plaster and bruised from the impact, the Ijichi rocket glowered like a feral cat at Rina, whose offending hand still hovered above the site of her attack. Seika rubbed her butt and growled out, “The Hell’s gotten into you?”
“Earth to Seika – you were crying over a pair of tights. My voice wasn’t getting through, so… But seriously, girl? There’s no reason to weep over this. Your figure is awesome, and I know that Japanese society isn’t quite there yet about big bu–” And Rina’s voice then gently faded into the backdrop of Seika’s mind.
So she’d been crying, then? A preliminary test proved that hypothesis to be correct, as her fingers came away damp. She’d have to buy those tear-stained tights and apologize to the owner later.
These tears weren’t for the mother she dearly missed.
They weren’t for the youthful days she’d given up for a dream.
There was no loss of innocence she grieved, nor was there something she truly yearned for in those nostalgic depths…
Aside from one, singular thing. A chance for something else, for something that haunted her still, wearing the face of a person she thought to surrender to the whims of fate. As her path diverged from Rina’s, her path had diverged from countless others – to be human was to change, to grow, and to leave old things behind – as she could no longer hold fast to the lifestyle required to remain in the lives of so many people. Manager Seika was a distant star that the student and guitarist Seika could only barely see from her telescope.
For a time, her eyes were far from fixed on any kind of sparkling dream such as that. Imagining herself as a responsible person, what a farce! She could care less about who she was or wanted to be, because for a single moment in eternity, she felt like she’d found where she wanted to be.
At her side.
Perhaps the greatest thing to surrender was love itself.
In a daze, Seika followed Rina to the club her band was playing at. It was an intimate gig, the room’s capacity was no more than 50 patrons – that was more than enough, as each seat was filled, and all comers had some sort of drink in hand. They played a kind of wash of sound, with distorted guitars, trembling notes – the singer’s voice was breathy, the bassist and the guitarist were almost constantly countering the melodies each other introduced, and Rina offered a steady, yet surprisingly textured, beat that kept the wall of noise somewhat hinged. It reminded her somewhat of Dead Girl in Closet, a dream pop act.
Seika stirred her straw in her drink. It was alcoholic, of course, and the smell sent excavators through her brain – each which then dug up memories that’d long been buried by the sands of time. She’d stopped clubbing years ago, but it wasn’t because of Nijika or STARRY, was it? The alcohol… that’s why. She quit drinking for years and picked it up because she’d forgotten why she’d quit.
But the hazy, dreamlike sound… the intimate seating and lighting… the drinks…
Kikuri. She’d been here with Kikuri. A chord of regret sang through her heartstrings, and as Seika listened along to NaNa’s cloudy vocals, Seva’s nebulous bassline, Scruff’s almost wordy strumming, and Rina’s encompassing, heartbeat drumming – she could feel the dreams of yesteryear finally touch the ground once again.
The source of her alienation. She’d come back to the Earth without her soul. And now that it had returned to her, Seika felt warmth in her chest for the first time since her mother died. This newfound sensation allowed her to fully lean into the song. Would she allow herself this? To enjoy a moment alone, without work, without the need to take care of someone else? No… but that’s because she was taking care of someone after all. Just, it’d been a person she’d stopped thinking about in her mad rush to foster her sister’s dreams.
It was Seika Ijichi that she was looking out for.
She looked down at her face in the reflection of her drink and smiled. The smile reached her eyes. It was time to be done with this – it was time for Seika to make her stand. At last, after all these years, Seika knew what she needed to do to guide Nijika away from the destruction of her world; she could save their band, and possibly even save Hitori.
All that was left was to make that final, brave step. And so Seika would bravely go, aboard her rocket ship once more, to search stellar aeons. This time, she’d be sure to not lose sight of the Earth – to lose sight of what she loved.