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Nezumi stared out the window of the bus at the trees flashing by. It almost looked like someone had swiped a brush against a wet painting and smeared all the lines. Just a blur of green, flecked with yellow and brown, against a bright blue sky. Honestly, though, it was kind of disorienting, so he closed his eyes and snuggled his earphones a little further into his ears.
Midnight
Not a sound from the pavement
Has the moon lost her memory
She is smiling alone
He hummed under his breath, just under the chatter from his classmates and the noise from the bus, so no one would hear what he was humming. Nezumi wasn’t ashamed of his taste in music – far from it. He just didn’t feel the need for anyone to know the extent he loved Cats the Musical right now.
Right now, he just wanted to relax and sleep. They had been walking all freaking day. He didn’t anticipate a trip to the freaking La Brea Tar Pits would be so exhausting.
In the lamplight
The withered leaves collect at my feet
And the wind begins to moan
Nezumi sighed. That was probably the last field trip he would ever go on. This was West Block Junior High’s one and only field trip of the year – a day’s visit to the La Brea Tar Pits, where eighth graders can wander around aimlessly for hours and find nothing remotely interesting among thousands of dead animal skeletons.
Normally he liked field trips – hey, any ticket out of class was good with him. But even better was that field trips gave him the opportunity to get out of West Block, and to be among different people, and see sights and buildings that weren’t withered beyond repair. It was a nice and needed change of scenery.
But the Tar Pits sucked.
Almost nothing happened. The only remotely interesting part of the whole trip was when this new white-haired boy was looking too far into one of the tar pits and almost fell in. Nezumi had yanked his hood and pulled him back in time, though. What a weirdo.
Memory, all alone in the moonlight
I can dream of the old days
Life was beautiful then
Tap tap tap.
Nezumi jumped up. “What the hell?”
The person next to him was tapping on his leg. And lo and behold, it was the weirdo that almost became a fossil himself. And he was had been sitting next to Nezumi for who knows how long. Goes to show how awake Nezumi was – this day had tired him out more than he thought.
The boy was smiling. He looked like he said something, but Nezumi couldn’t hear, so he angrily took out his earphones.
I remember the time I knew what happiness was
Let the mem –
Nezumi glared at the kid, waiting for the explanation that justified silencing Barbara Streisand.
“Hey,” the kid said.
“What?” Nezumi growled.
The white haired kid just smiled. And to be honest, it was kind of a nice smile, all sincere and crap.
“You know how on the bus ride back from an awesome field trip when the people sitting next to each other on the bus talk about how cool their day was during the entire ride home and along that ride they get to know each other and somehow along the way they become life long friends?”
“No.”
“Oh.” The boy’s enthusiasm waivered, but only for a moment. “Would you like to know?”
Nezumi looked the kid over. The goofy grin on his face and the way he was leaning in towards Nezumi made it clear - he was absolutely serious.
In no way did Nezumi want to participate in a conversation right now. But the kid was kind of cute, and he had an interesting face. The white hair, of course, made him interesting to look at, and somehow it complemented his creamy skin and eyes, which were such a bright brown they were almost red. And there was a scar on his face, too; a red mark that looked like a band-aid running across the left side of his face. Maybe if he could just keep the kid talking, he could get a real eyeful…
“Not really. But if you feel the overwhelming need to tell me about your day, I will be your substitute mother.” Nezumi smirked at the kid’s blush.
“I’m Shion.” ‘Shion’ extended a hand out to him.
He took it and gave a single hard shake, like professionals do. “Nezumi.”
“I just asked because…well this probably the last field trip we’ll ever go on. And then we’ll never have this opportunity again – to get to know someone you’ve never even talked to before. That’s actually how I met my first best friend – Safu. She and I were partners back in second grade for this fieldtrip to this old house from the 1800s, and we had this competition going to see who could name the most facts…it was dumb, really, but we ended up fighting and she hit me and made my nose bleed. That was halfway through the trip though, so we had to wait on the bus together with one of the parent volunteers, and Safu told me exactly how to hold my nose to stop the bleeding, and from there…we just sort of became friends.”
Ah, so Nezumi was right. The kid – Shion – was a talker. Nezumi liked the way his eyes lit up when he was talking. There was a red glint to them – a warm glint, though, not evil at all, but like fireplaces in wintertime. So he decided to keep Shion talking. “You’re new, right?”
He nodded. “Yep, I just moved to West Block.”
“Well then I formally welcome you to the dump,” Nezumi proclaimed, stretching his arms out in gesture to the dump they were heading back to. Shion laughed. “It’s almost the end of the year though – why’d you move?”
Shion pulled into himself and paled. Obviously that was not something he wanted to discuss. Nezumi should have known it would be a poor subject. No one moved to West Block for any good reason.
A different subject, then. “Hey – why’s your hair white? No offense – it actually looks pretty cool, but, like, why?”
Shion looked up and blushed a little. “Really? You think it’s cool?”
Nezumi laughed – this kid was so easy to please. “Sure.”
“Well,” Shion began, “I was going to dye my hair blonde. Just…for a bit of change, you know? But, um, I kind of had some issues with the bleach…and left it in too long…”
Nezumi burst out laughing. This kid was an idiot! It seemed as though he had zero street smarts. It was kind of endearing.
Shion looked mortified at first, but slowly joined in. Soon they were both cackling like jackals, and the people in the benches around them turned to look. Nezumi took deep breaths to steady himself. He choked and sputtered and that made Shion laugh even more. Nezumi smirked and gave him a light punch on the arm.
Once they had both calmed down enough, Nezumi felt the need to say, “That was really…wow. You must have been really out of it at the time…”
Shion hung his head. “Yeah, I guess you could say that…it’s so embarrassing though…”
Nezumi could feel the awkward tension coming back, so he reached his hand up and examined a bit of Shion’s hair. Shion immediacy tensed up, leaning back as Nezumi leaned forward, not letting him go. But Shion didn’t quite pull away either.
Nezumi ran is hand through the white fluff. Sure enough, near his scalp, Nezumi could pick out the little brown roots. Shion couldn’t have dyed his hair long ago, then. As he pulled away, Nezumi could feel tension radiating from the white haired boy.
Nezumi smirked; Shion was blushing bright red. He loved when he had that effect on people. It felt like he was in control, a feeling anyone in West Block would cherish. “Were you a brunette?”
Shion flitted his eyes up and down and nodded.
Nezumi smiled and leaned back towards the window again. “Well, I like it. That color suits you. It gives you that mysterious vibe.”
Shion blushed deeper, but gave a little laugh. “If anyone had the mysterious vibe, it’d be you.”
“Me?” Of course, Nezumi already knew that he was ‘mysterious’ – that was by design. The long dark hair, never talking to anyone he didn’t have to, being an ass about sharing his personal business, wearing dark clothes, he could go on and on.
“Don’t play dumb. You know it, too. You’re trying to be that way, right?” So. The kid wasn’t as stupid as he looked.
Nezumi scoffed and turned back to the window. “What’s it to you?”
Nezumi could practically feel Shion roll his eyes. “Just an observation, jeez. Why do you do it?”
Shut up.
“Is it because you’re going through a phase and you’re angry with the world?”
Shut UP.
“No…you’re just really closed off. You don’t want to talk to anyone, so you count on your mysteriousness to keep them away.”
SHUT UP.
“Probably because you had something tragic happen to you – ”
“SHUT UP!” Nezumi whipped around to face that idiot again. “What the hell’s your problem?! My business is my freaking business! Leave me the hell alone!”
Shion looked shocked and withdrew into himself again. Good. The freak deserved it.
Not that he’d been wrong. In fact, he had been exactly right, and that was the problem. How the hell did he know?! Why the hell would he say those things out loud?! NO ONE was supposed to know.
Satisfied that he had sufficiently scared Shion, Nezumi turned back around and put his earphones in again and watched the trees fly by.
He had only been listening for a few minutes when he felt a tap on his leg again.
Nezumi elected to ignore it, and see if it would stop.
Tap tap tap.
TAP TAP TAP.
That was it.
“Ah!” Shion shrieked as Nezumi yanked his hand forward. He held it in a death grip and gritted out, “What?”
Shion looked kind of terrified and Nezumi would be lying if he said he didn’t feel a little bad. After all, even though this kid could see right through him, he was a certifiable idiot.
Nezumi relaxed his grip a bit and glared at Shion, waiting for a response.
Shion regained his composure and tried to yank his hand back. Nezumi wasn’t letting him off that easy, though. Shion tugged and tugged but Nezumi didn’t let up his grip. Shion groaned, and then huffed, “Jeez, I just wanted to say sorry.”
Sorry? People in West Block didn’t say sorry. Nezumi’s grip relaxed a little.
Sorry?
“…I shouldn’t have said those things, especially assuming…anyways, yeah, I shouldn’t have disrespected my savior.”
Nezumi looked into Shion’s bright eyes; they were unwavering. Nezumi released his grip, and Shion took his hand back and cradled hit in his lap. Nezushi whispered under his breath, “Didn’t think you even saw me…”
Shion rolled his eyes. “Of course I did! As soon as you saved me from falling over the edge, I turned around to thank you, but you were walking away already. Your dark clothing is kind of hard to miss.”
The kid was right. Even though he wore dark jeans and a black jacket and dark head of hair to blend in, he stuck out like a sore thumb amidst these normal people. (Normal for West Block, at least).
“…you said you were going to thank me?” Nezumi asked.
“Yeah, I guess I was. So – thank you. For saving me from becoming a museum exhibit,” Shion said, with that goofy smile plastered across his face again.
Nezumi fought down a grin of his own. This kid radiated happiness, and it was contagious. Nezumi would have to do his best to avoid catching it. “Psh. You shouldn’t have been leaning that far over the bar anyways! What were you trying to do, become one with the tar?”
“No! I was just trying to see better. I think it’s really interesting how animals become fossilized and everything…”
Shion talked about all the places they had gone, from the exhibits to the tar pits to the gift shop to the lab where people could see scientists cleaning fossils. Apparently he was really into ecology, and his eyes lit up again like they had earlier, with that warm red glint.
“Why do you like ecology so much?” Nezumi asked eventually.
“Oh! Because, well, I love how everything is connected. It’s just so amazing how the environmental cycles work, always replenishing themselves, and making new things from completely different things. Like how we are descended from other humanoids, and evolution in general. And life continues on. But then, for some species, it doesn’t. Like the mammoths or the dire wolves whose bones we saw – that was the end. They don’t have any direct descendants. But we still get to see their bones, the only thing they left behind, thousands of years later. And I think that’s really cool.”
“That was quite a speech.”
“Was it?”
“It really was.”
Nezumi leaned back and flipped through his albums, decided which one to listen to next. He had one earphone in so he could listen to musicals with one ear and listen to Shion with the other. He was feeling pretty good at the moment – Chorus Line good. Chorus Line was possibly Nezumi’s favorite musical – it was the first one he had seen live (albeit at a shady theatre with terrible singers and a drunken crowd).
“Hey Nezumi,” Shion asked innocently.
This automatically put Nezumi on his guard. He narrowed his eyes, and asked, “What?”
“What are you listening to?” Goddammit. He didn’t want to have to explain his strange taste in music to his new friend – was Shion his friend? He didn’t know. They were acting friendly, but then again just an hour ago Nezumi had yelled at him.
He would have just played some other music, but literally every track on his iPod was from a musical. What could he say; he was a man of one taste
“…what kind of music do you like, Shion?” he asked instead.
“Um…just about anything, really. I just love music in general.” Of course. How could Nezumi expect anything else from this angel?
Shion wouldn’t judge him, right? Shion was too nice to judge him. Just one look into his bright eyes and you could tell he was just full of curiosity. He wasn’t looking to hurt Nezumi.
Still, he could count on two fingers to number of people who knew his music tastes. If Shion spread the word, there was no way anyone would take him seriously again.
But Shion was Shion. And though Nezumi hardly trusted anyone, there was something about Shion that screamed ‘safe’. Nezumi wanted to trust him. And there was only one way to find out if he really could.
So he handed Shion the other earphone. Shion raised his eyebrows, and Nezumi nodded, motioning to take it. Shion bounced up and down with a grin on his face, fitting the piece into his ear.
Nezumi leaned in towards him and muttered under his breath, “If you say one word – I kick your ass into next week, got it?”
Shion nodded eagerly.
“And don’t…talk too loud about it either. I don’t want anyone…to know what I listen to.”
Shion nodded again, and looked serious. Good. This was serious stuff.
Nezumi decided to go with something light – everyone knows Sound of Music, right?
“Oh my gosh!” Shion whispered respectfully, clapping his hands over his mouth. “I love this movie!”
“Musical,” Nezumi corrected. But he grinned at Shion’s enthusiasm all the same.
“My mom and I used to watch this all the time before…” he trailed off, gazing out the window for the rest of the song. When it was over, and the next one began, he turned his gaze back to Nezumi. “Thank you. It brings back good memories. I appreciate that.”
Nezumi smiled. He was glad he made Shion glad. That was...a feeling he hadn’t felt in a really long time.
They listened to the rest of the soundtrack on the way back in silence. It was nice, having Shion sitting next to him, sharing music that was special to him, and just being content and relaxed for once.
“So do you think we’ll be life long friends, Nezumi?” Shion asked as they pulled up to the curb.
Nezumi smirked. “We’ll see.” He turned back to the window, to see their crappy school building. The truth was Nezumi really wanted to be friends with Shion. It’s not like he had a lot of friends as it was, and Shion was one of very, very few people in West Block Nezumi considered to be remotely nice. There was something about him that Nezumi was attracted to. He thought it was a combination of his hair and his compassion and his smile.
They slung their bags over their shoulders and skittered off the bus. A woman who had Shion’s brown eyes was waving from across the parking lot, by a run down grey sedan. Shion turned towards her and waved.
“That’s my mom. I guess I’ll see you later?” Shion asked.
Nezumi sighed. If he hadn’t seen the white haired boy so far at school, he probably didn’t have any classes with him. And Nezumi always left for lunch. It unlikely they’d see each other much.
“Sure,” Nezumi said, and watched Shion as he walked away to his ride.
He really hoped he and Shion would meet again.