Salmon - Agree/Affirm
Bonito flakes - Disagree/deny
Kelp - Greeting
Mustard Leaf - Concern / Worry
Salmon Roe - To grab attention
Tuna - Focus
Tuna tuna - Look
Tuna mayo - Talk
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Your eyes strain at the painting you're working on. Your art teacher selects an assignment for the class to paint a scenery that catches your eye on the school campus. With the weather being nice out, your class paints outside. But you struggle with the assignment itself. You've never liked art class.
You couldn't differentiate color. Everything is in the dark and light colors of gray. You always figured this is the same for everyone. But you quickly learn it's not when you entered school at the young age for kindergarten. One day your teacher asked you to tell her the color of the block she held up and you confidently answered her with the word gray.
Thunderous laughter erupted from your peers, followed by a peculiar look from your teacher. Each block she held up, you answered her with either dark or light gray. You couldn't understand why she was confused and why your classmates laughed like they had. You didn't say anything funny. Following after that day, your teacher spoke to your parents about your "condition".
Your parents had no idea about your lack of color. They've taken you to doctors who offered glasses that may help you see color. But they didn't work for you. You didn't understand why your parents worried about your lack of color. You lived fine before. You couldn't miss something you never had anyway.
But your life only became harder when you needed to know colors. Tasks and questions with color became difficult. Like when your mother would ask you to hand her the green bell peppers instead of the red or yellow. Or when you had to learn the colors of a traffic light. You couldn't believe how hard life became just because of one thing you lacked.
The older you got, the harsher the peers around you would poke fun of you for it. At first it didn't bother you much. The bullying were tedious things like picking fun of you for choosing the wrong colored socks that morning. But as you moved from elementary to middle school, the bullying became worse. Others would make it painfully obvious when you couldn't answer questions dealt with color.
You wondered why they went out of their way to make you feel terrible for something you had no control over. What's so great about color anyway? Why did you have to be made fun of seeing life in grayscale? Why does your pain give them greater enjoyment?
Nothing made you more upset than art class had. Your classmates would laugh and knit pick your drawings. Saying you colored the sky brown instead of blue. Coloring the grass pink instead of green. Drawing the sun red instead of yellow.
Others would pity you, muttering under their breath how unlucky you are to see life in such a depressing shade. One day someone purposely swapped the uniform colors that you had to wear for a school trip to one of the rivalry schools. You try to not recall the thunderous laughter and fingers being pointed at you when you entered campus that day. Your parents scolded the school for the bullying you received but they fell on deaf ears.
Now you're in high school and the bullying continues. Maturity seems nonexistent as you grow older. You stiffen when you hear the sound of grass crunch behind you. A male classmate of yours narrows their eyes on your canvas. He snatches one of the paint bottles from your bag.
"Let me help you with that." He snickers under his breath, squeezing globs of paint onto your canvas. You look at the boy in horror, smacking his hand to drop the paint he holds. He glares daggers at you, a menacing look in his eyes. "The fuck Y/L/N?!"
This commotion brings attention from the other peers around you and your teacher. She hurries over to the two of you, eyeing you first before the boy. "What are you doing over here, Hiroshi?" Hiroshi clicks his tongue, pointing his finger over to you.
"I was only trying to help Y/L/N with her painting and she slapped me for it." Hiroshi partially lies, a glimmer in his eyes when he darts his eyes over to you. Your teacher raises an eyebrow, resting her stern gaze on you. She silently waits for your response.
Parting your lips slightly, you point at your painting. "Hiroshi wasn't helping. He came over to ruin my painting." Your voice comes out shaky with how nervous you are from the confrontation. Another voice cuts into the conversation, one belonging to a girl.
"I saw everything, Ms. Yuki. Y/L/N did slap Hiroshi. Look at the red mark on his hand. If she could see color she would've noticed that Hiroshi was correcting the color of the sky for her." The girl scoffs, rolling her eyes at you.
You stiffen, flicking your eyes over to your teacher who sighs helplessly. "Apologize to Hiroshi, Y/L/N." You stare at her in disbelief. If Hiroshi intended to help you, his actions came off wrong. Pursing your lips, you shake your head.
"I didn't ask for his help and he still ruined my painting, Ms. Yuki." You remain firm on your statement. Hiroshi scoffs as he cracks his neck. Hiroshi being short tempered, shoves your painting off the easel. Your painting falls face first into the grass.
Ms. Yuki widens her eyes, quick to scold Hiroshi who waves her off. Your eyes stare at the painting that rests beside you. Extending your hand to your canvas, Hiroshi steps on your fingers. You grit your teeth, not wanting to yelp out. You flick your eyes up to the boy who towers over you.
"I hope you go blind one day Y/L/N. You're undeserving of sight." Hiroshi twists his foot on your hand. The pain causes tears to well up in your eyes. Ms. Yuki pulls Hiroshi away, yelling at him to go to the principals office. She then looks over your hand.
With a sigh, she shakes her head. "You're in the wrong as well Y/L/N. But I won't send you to the principal, instead head to the nurses office and ask for a bag of ice. Your fingers are swelling up." You hear whispers throughout your peers, a few giggling.
You don't retort to her words. You've brought enough unwanted attention to yourself already. Bowing slightly, you turn your back to Ms. Yuki and the rest of your classmates. The warm weather feels cold to you. You no longer expect a single day to go by without someone bullying you.
You couldn't even go to the nurses office in peace when you see Hiroshi leaning against the brick wall of the school building. He hadn't walked straight over to the principals office like Ms. Yuki suggested. His eyes flick over to you when you attempt to walk past him. But you don't go far when you feel his hand snatch your right wrist. You feel him roughly shove your against the wall.
A pain ripples out from your back, your breath knocked out of you. Hiroshi holds your right arm up against the wall, his eyes dangerous. "Thanks to you I'll be paying a visit to the principal for the third time this week." He spits out, anger fueled in his voice.
"Who's fault is that?" You mutter out, extending your left hand out to pry his hands away from your right arm. He roughly slaps your left hand away and follows up with a slap across your face. Your eyes widen and waver from the burn against your cheek.
"For a quiet girl, you sure know how to back talk Y/L/N. Are you mentally unaware too? Read the room. I have the upper-hand here." Hiroshi growls under his breath, digging his nails into your wrist. Panic and anxiety consumes you when you stare at the boy in front of you like a deer in headlights.
You mentally tell yourself to slap him, kick him, scream-- anything. But you're paralyzed in your spot. "That's much better Y/L/N." Hiroshi clicks his tongue when you remain silent. He releases his hold on you, shoving his hands into his pockets. "Next time, keep shut when I'm around. Don't say a word to Ms. Yuki about this."
Hiroshi turns around, not heading to the principals like he was told to. You follow him with your eyes, watching him walk off towards the school courtyard to kill time. You feel your muscles come back to you. You stare at what you assume is your redden right wrist and cup your cheek with your left hand.
Today is the last straw.
You stare at the building beside you, walking past it and heading out of the school campus. The amount of pain you've accumulated since the age of five to sixteen is too much for you to handle. You've never learned a good outlet to let out the stress. You tried to continue living for your parents but your thoughts get the better of you. Selfishness clouds your mind along with dark thoughts.
No amount of tears or self pity will stop the pain. Self harm has always been on the back of your mind but you were too much of a wimp to go through with it. But not today. The thought of ending it all feels so clear. You've wandered over to a bridge you frequently have to cross to get to school. With the time being noon, the traffic is light.
You scan your surroundings of any passing cars. A few drive by but you doubt they had the chance to glance your way. Everyone in Tokyo are busy thinking about themselves. That being said, majority of everyone is looking after their selves. Not just the citizens in Tokyo.
You reach for your phone but forget that you had left it in the classroom. The lack of pockets on your uniform restricted you from having your phone on you. You at least wanted to leave your parents a parting message that you loved them. But maybe it's better off if you didn't. You inhale deeply, resting your hands on the railing in front of you.
A breeze flutters through your hair and skirt. You can only imagine that the sky is a beautiful blue with how warm the sun kisses your skin. The weather is beautiful and perfect for your last day. You ached to see what your world looks like in color but it's an impossible wish.
Who knew something so small like color can really hurt you. Why are you the only one like this? Did you hurt some God in your past life? There's too many unanswered questions and impossible miracles to happen. You were too ignorant when you were a child to think this wouldn't bother you.
Not wanting to dwell in your thoughts anymore, you tightly grip onto the railing. You raise one knee up onto the top of the railing, readying yourself to jump off and crash into the rough cold water below. The wind kisses your skin one last and you give into your negative thoughts once and for all. Tears litter your face as you whisper a goodbye to the world that never accepted you.
You begin to release your hold on the railing, ready to drop yourself when an unfamiliar voice shouts out. "STOP!" You figured it's too late for this stranger to help you. But your muscles tense, your body paralyzed. You try to move but your body renders frozen. Confused, your brows knit together.
You turn your attention over to the person who's shouted towards you. A slim, mid-length haired boy hurries to your side. His school uniform is different from yours. It's collar oddly high, covering his mouth. He meets your eyes for a second before looking behind you.
You watch him lower his collar, a peculiar marking is on each side of his mouth. "Explode." Your eyes widen, confused by his choice of words and you feared for your life. But nothing happens to you physically. Other than the fact that the grays you look at him with turns into one of color.
The first color you notice is the purple of his eyes and then the platinum blonde of his hair. The boy carefully lowers you down from the railing. His purple eyes silently staring at you. Neither of you say a word as you're stunned by the color you're seeing before you.
Who is he and how are you suddenly seeing color?