Almost a year later...
A blanket wrapped his shivering shoulders where he leaned over the balcony watching a honey-colored glow from the West beam low through the neighboring houses. Actually I should say he leaned against the balcony; this year's growth spurt had been so short lived I don't know if you could call it a spurt at all. He still couldn't prop his chin on the top of the rail without standing on his toes. But still he watched while the yellow wildflowers sprouting in the sea of concrete closed their vibrant petals, a dense fog hovering over the back-alleys and swallowing his beloved red post box.
Dad was in a sour mood today and The Boy's skin still stung where the wedding ring had left a welt on his cheek. But the child's bad day had begun way before he came home to an angry father. It was kicked off by his only friend at school, a kid named Shoma Ushio, ignoring his request to save him a seat with the other boys at lunch. To top it off, his gut tickled queasily with dread watching the dusk creep nearer – nothing but a sign that the worst part of the night was yet to come: the night itself.
You might think Yukiné's fear of the dark is childish. But trust me, by the age of nine he'd been given a pretty damn good reason for the phobia.
The Boy's thin belly shuddered a long and loud rumble. He knew his father liked him to stay small and skinny because it made him feel puny and submissive, like a kid should be to his elders. But he'd love it if Dad just trusted him to obey and allowed him to eat dinner before homework and chores every now and then...
He missed the days when his father adored everything he did. But when he remembered that it was only at the expense of Big Sis he told himself it was still okay, because he was the one Dad loved, and the way he was treated wasn't half as bad as what she went through. He told himself these things often and tried to be happy for his sister getting to live with Mom. Yet some days he couldn't help but get this mean little voice in his head that wanted to go back to being the safe one while his sister got the short end of the stick...
As the warmth behind the tree-line panned from vermillion to ochre and the air got nippier, The Boy pulled the blanket closer around him and stepped back inside, locking the doors again and hiding the key under the floor mat so Dad wouldn't know he'd snuck it. Turning round, his shadow on the tatami was lean and tall, almost reaching the opposite wall. With the comforter around his shoulders the silhouette laid across his mess of futon and pillows looked broader, like a king or god in fine robes. The Boy stuck out his arms and tried some different poses, giggling briefly at what a phony image the shadow granted him.
His shadow was his only friend many evenings like this trapped in his room. They played together often. But even it abandoned him at nightfall.
Nowadays his room was still the same lonely prison it always was but he'd been granted a few new additions – just enough to keep him sane. Although his father confiscated any family pictures that included Mom and Big Sis, he allowed his son to post a couple drawings and posters. Other than that the kid found one of his favorite past times was playing at how precariously he could balance his growing stack of comics. But the one thing in his room that excited him most was currently his pride and joy: a cheap skate board Dad had found and taught him to ride. He thought it would be cheaper than making his son use public transportation all the time, and The Boy loved the feeling of freedom it gave him. Of course, the board was a full sized one so the little guy grated his knees a few hundred times before he got the hang of it; but he didn't mind. The red and yellow splatter paintwork on its underside was gorgeous, the coolest looking thing he'd ever owned. He always kept the colors facing outward where it leaned against his black dresser.
But I digress. The Boy was nauseous from hunger. It had been several hours since he got home from school and was banished here. It should be safe to ask now, right? Muffled voices and noises that sounded like Dad's favorite sit-com droned through the thin walls, so he decided to shoot his shot. With his heart in his throat he crept down the hall, following the sounds of the TV until he reached the opening to the cluttered den. Hugging the corner of the wall, he peeked his head around to see the TV screen. Dad had his feet propped on the coffee table littered with beer cans and made no sign of noticing his son. But The Boy knew he saw him.
The kid waited for the commercial break before clearing his throat. "Um, Dad?"
The man took his time replying, snapping the remote at the monitor. "What do you want?"
"I was just wondering," said the child with a cough as his nervous breath caught in his throat, "If... I could have dinner now, please?"
"Is your room clean?" Dad muttered, staring at the screen.
"Yes, sir."
"Your homework done?"
"...Yes." The child looked at the coffee table, the TV, the kitchen, anywhere except at his father.
Dad's eyes strayed from the TV, "Are you lying to me?"
The Boy swallowed the hardness in his throat. "...Yes."
The man let out a sigh, chewing the inside of his cheek. "You know, son... maybe if you would quit being so lazy about your education – which I am paying dearly to provide – we wouldn't be so poor, you know?"
Dad raised his brows pitifully and matter-of-factly. The Boy dropped his gaze, guilt seeping into his gut.
"I mean, if you're just going to brush off your school work like this then I don't need to keep throwing away my money on it, right?" Dad shrugged cynically with a half-grin as if the thought amused him. "Might actually be better for the both of us. Maybe then I could actually afford to buy myself a car. And you wouldn't have any more responsibilities to worry about. You could just grow up and be a god damn retard." Dad laughed. "Sounds good to me, how about you? You want to be taken out of school?"
The Boy shook his head.
"Then why the hell are you asking to eat? You know better."
The child pouted his lip, fidgeting his feet.
"Hello??" Dad sang sardonically. "Haven't you learned to speak or did you fall asleep for those lessons too?"
The Boy furrowed his brow at the carpet. "I'm still at the top of my class, Dad... and I will finish it, I've already been working for a couple hours. But I... couldn't figure out this one math problem."
"Oh, I see." Dad mocked empathy. "And obviously ignoring the problem makes it solve itself, is that what they teach you in class?"
"...No."
"Well, then I think you should go deal with it sooner than later, don't you?"
"Can't I just have a little snack real quick?" Desperation stoked The Boy's bravery, "I didn't finish breakfast this morning and I gave some of my lunch to my friend at school. I could focus better if I wasn't hungry."
Dad shot forward in his seat and leaned a pointed glower at his son. "Did I stutter?"
The latter gripped his roiling abdomen. "No, sir."
The parent sat back again with a shake of his head, tossing his empty beer can in the general direction of the bin in the kitchen. It clunked off the counter and hit the floor about three feet from the goal. Dad wasn't too drunk yet, The Boy thought hopefully – he had learned to evaluate his father's level of intoxication by how far his normally excellent aim was thrown off.
As Dad let out a huge yawn, telling The Boy to grab him another beer. The Boy marched to the kitchen and, picking up the empty can, put it in the trash and moved to the fridge to fetch his father yet another. His nausea worsened all the more as he handed his parent the cold can, bracing himself again.
"Dad?" he said quickly, hoping to get a quick answer before the show came back on.
"What??" the man sighed.
"N-Nishioka-sensei wanted me to ask you something." The child swallowed a cough and tried not to reach for his inhaler. "My class is getting together on the 13th for a parent fellowship and play-date for us kids. She wanted us to come."
"When?" Dad's voice rose an octave.
"The 13th."
"No," Came the hurried rejoinder. "I told you, that's when I'm starting work at the factory."
"But," The Boy pleaded, "It's a dinner picnic. It doesn't start until 5:30 so it'll be way after you get off. We could even show up a little late –"
Dad gave a menacing look that sent The Boy into tail-tucked retreat without further protest.
After another hour or so in his room, the pile of textbooks on his nightstand-desk was finally shrunk down to the last book. Violently rubbing his aching eyes, barely held open by sheer force of will, he shoved his supplies into his backpack for tomorrow. Sleepiness had long-since overruled the cramps in his empty stomach. Sitting straight on a sitting pillow atop his mess of blankets, he stretched and twisted. The numbers of the alarm clock on the desk read "too-late-to-eat pm." The sound of late-night news broadcasts muffled through the walls. Dad must have crashed on the couch because he never watched the news this late. Although he wouldn't be allowed to eat without showing Dad his completed assignments, The Boy would rather go hungry any day than wake his father from a dead sleep.
The Boy blinked firmly to keep his eyelids from drooping. There was one more thing he absolutely had to do before he could relieve himself from the feat of staying awake. After prepping his futon for bed and changing into one of Dad's old T-shirts, the hem of which reached his mid shin, he furtively approached the door, listening carefully until he heard Dad's snores.
Shutting off the overhead light so the room was lit only by his desk lamp, he took Mom's letter from this morning out of his coat pocket where he'd hidden it from his father. Rolling onto his belly under the covers, he peeled open the blue envelope and read her letter, fingering some blank notebook paper and chewing the end of a pencil.
The trepidation that came with merely holding one of these forbidden letters was enough to rouse him better than three cups of espresso. But soon his mother's voice came alive in the memory of his ears, as soothing as ever.
He had done an excellent job never letting his father suspect Mom had sent any letter at all. Dad was a creature of habit and never went himself to collect the mail but always left it up to The Boy, making the whole thing very easy. As you probably already guessed, The Boy had eventually decided to send a letter back telling Mom that Dad had given him the green light, and so they had been writing each other ever since. Because neither of his parents knew that Mom didn't have Dad's consent, in the beginning there were of course some hurtles, such as the mother wanting to know if The Boy would call her on the phone to chat, but nothing that the child couldn't lie his way out of with responses like "Dad won't let me because he thinks talking on the phone is bad for me learning how to communicate."
But his mother's letters weren't always satisfactory. No matter how many times he asked, Mom never said much about when or how they would get to see each other again. She'd just tell him not to worry and that someday they'd go together.
The Boy read the loving address and endnote over and over, closing his eyes and imagining her face smiling as she spoke. With heart soaring, The Boy picked up his own pen and paper.
"Dear Mom,
I miss you guys so bad! Yes, I'm good in school and I'm still at the top of my class. My lowest grade is a 76 in PE. But that's 'cause the other kids think I'm too little to play the games."
He did his best to keep answering Mom's simple questions, stomach still whining for food and lungs still stinging a little from coughing as he reached her question about his health. It took a moment but eventually he composed a nice sounding white lie about getting plenty to eat and that his asthma wasn't getting worse. For a while longer The Boy jotted things he thought his mother would be happy to hear. With time, as his ramblings onto the paper came more easily he found himself venting.
Mom probably would've taken him to the play date without any grief at all. She never gave him any grief about wanting to be normal kid. He recalled a line from her last letter,
'There's nothing you can't tell me, darling.'
With this consolation, he vented one last woe; one that had been weighing on his conscience all day. He started by telling her what happened this morning at school with Shoma Ushio. The end of his letter sounded a little like this:
"Also, Mom, how do you know if it's wrong to do something? Today at lunch I asked Ushio-kun to save me a seat at the cafeteria but he went to hang out with his other friends and forgot. I really want them to like me, so when they asked me to steal the last bag of cookies from one of the lower class girls, I did. Or I was going to, but she was enjoying them so I felt bad. I let them have my bag of cookies instead. Ushio-kun laughed at me and I didn't know why I couldn't do it. Ushio-kun and his friends deserved the cookies just as much as the girl did, right? I guess I thought you would be mad at me if I started being mean to the younger kids. But is stealing really bad? My teachers say thieves end up lonely because no one trusts them, but what if I stole something that Dad and me really needed? Then it would be okay, right? What do you think I should have done? I'm really confused."
He ached to do anything and everything to make her proud. Maybe if she was proud enough she'd want to come see him faster. Whether stealing was wrong or not, he didn't yet have the maturity to tell or care. All he knew was a prick in his chest at the thought of Mom being sad that he and Dad stole people's money almost daily. Money seemed to be a big deal to adults though, so for now cookies seemed a safe enough topic to ask about.
The Boy was lucky enough to pilfer some stamps from Dad once but never any envelopes. Instead he learned how to fold and tape paper into envelopes and like so began packaging this reply letter to Mom. Tomorrow he would wake up extra early for school and drop off the letter in the mailbox. He was about to address the front of the parcel when something in the air went stiff and silent. The monotonous hum of the TV in the den had been shut off. Heavy footsteps drew closer approaching the hall to the two bedrooms. Panic polluted the child's circulation.
He crumpled excess notepad paper and thrust everything, envelopes, pencil, and stamps, under his pillow. The creaking of the hallway floorboards paused. It sounded to be at the doorway to the master bedroom. The child prayed they would stay there. Instead it sounded on again, coming closer.
He dropped flat and quickly rolled himself up in the blanket, hiding his face. His bedroom door sang a meticulous creak and he clamped his eyes shut, pretending hard to be asleep. There was a stillness that The Boy assumed was Dad staring, trying to see if he was really sleeping. His body felt the tatami mats give underneath the man tipsily crossing the room and reaching over his son to turn off the lamp on the nightstand, grumbling something about wasting electricty. There was a click and the inside of The Boy's eyelids went even darker. Dad then stumbled his way out of the room, almost tripping on the doorstep. An eternity stretched on until the sound of the master bedroom door closing allayed his seized breath.
The Boy didn't waste a second with eyes open to the darkness. He lurched for the lamp. With a pulse pounding in his throat his fingers flew in search of the knob, flicking it instantly upon finding it. The pale light reached just far enough to blanket the darkest corners of the space and The Boy's head fell back on the pillow again. A wave of relief like a breeze cleared his congested nerves in a weighty exhale.
He hated the dark.
To be continued...