quote:

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"Talking to it doesn't really seem to work. Also... well, I'm not all that sure it's dangerous. Karin said something... something about it being good. I didn't believe her, but maybe..."

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Suddenly it all changed. It wasn't crazy anymore; it was totally serious.

quote:

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“Do you…? Are you… unwell?”

---

I followed Kazuo as we all went to the roof.
When we got there and people settled, I sat on the floor near the main group, but far enough away to be more of an observer than taking part in the upcoming conversations.

I was intrigued if there would be some real information going on here and not all the speculating and romouring that had annoyed me a little.

I followed the others up to the roof, and watched Icchan curiously. In my short experience with him, any sort of contact implied some sort of business to take care of. Did he have any new information?

Kazuo was with us, and with him, was another person I had never met before. I thought to introduce myself but he had seated himself rather far away, so I postponed doing so until the opportunity presented itself. I looked at Icchan, wondering what exactly he wanted to say.

Post last edited by Theowne on 11.02.2007, 10:09 PM.

quote:

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“Oh… hi… ha…”

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Now this just feels wrong.

"Oy, you, don't be a stranger. Join the group."

I caught sight of Hasumi looking at me. "Ey, if we invited them, we might as well eat together, right? No point breaking into groups, not with so few people here."

"So, Kazuo-san. It must really suck to be Akuri's 'favourite' student, eh?" I said, drawing the quotations around 'favourite' with my fingers. "Don't worry, we're all behind you if you need us. Both mentally AND literally," I added, chuckling.

Post last edited by Roarkiller on 11.03.2007, 12:08 AM.

I could feel the warm clammy air moving my shirt collar and touching the skin of my face, arms and legs. The colour of the inside of my eyelids was a steady bright blanket meaning the sky was overcast but bright, no parade of clouds to dull the tone down darker every few moments as they transited the sun.

Casting shadows.

Drat it! Cut it out with the shadows will you?!

“Humf!”

Inside my eyelids Kazuo-san’s face swam into view. I considered it for a while. I suppose that if you really thought hard about it, it wasn’t that pretty, that handsome but it had something about it that wasn’t anything to do with the hair or eye colour. There was something behind the face, inside that head. That was what I found captivating...

I let my thoughts flow on...

quote:

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Originally posted by Roarkiller
"Oy, you, don't be a stranger. Join the group."

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Post last edited by Loscil on 11.03.2007, 06:10 AM.

I felt the atmosphere change like night coming down, it became cool.

Oh… you are unwell… what with…?

He turned partly round and took my hand. At any other time I’d have felt joy at his touch. Now it seemed… distant, like nothing at all.

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"I don't want to talk about it in front of everyone else. Can we go outside first?"

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We got to the pool. There’s raised bench seating here a bit like bleachers round the baseball pitch but indoors. I guess the whole school can sit and watch swimming competitions when it’s the sports festival. We sat down and began to eat.

She talked about being an only child but seemed very nervous and hesitant. Jumping like a scared rabbit. Maybe her family life wasn’t a happy one? But I wasn’t going to pry. I wouldn’t want to and wouldn’t know what to say anyway.

We were quiet for a long time and I began to get uncomfortable.

You can be silent with someone and it’s nice then another time with someone else it’s not. I don’t really understand it. Well, we were total strangers I suppose. If we got to know each other a little it would get better.

I just needed to think of what to say.

Instead I sat and watched three boys doing practice dives over and over again. They were senior years and nice to look at. Muscular. And lean. And wet. Hmmm…

I looked around us. There were one or two other groups of girls eating lunch here too.

Ah, I see, a regular haunt for some people… I smiled. Then she brought up the very subject I was thinking of.

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"Heh, the boy I've got my eyes on isn't here today sooo, I think watching a few others in swimming trunks is just what I need along with lunch,"

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“Hai. Of course. Anywhere you like.”

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Post last edited by arren18 on 11.03.2007, 10:30 AM.

Lunch had started and I was bored.

I didn't know where to go, so I thought: roof. Get a good look at the sky and relax a little. I noticed most of the class take off, important business, guess I am not involved, as usual.

I reached the roof and opened the door, had my eyes shut for a second and walked a few feet out and then I re-opened them, and there was a crowd of my class sitting.

"Gomen, I uhhhh, whats all going on? Did I miss a memo or something? My entire class is sitting on the roof..."

I didn't know how to continue, so I had a deer in the head lights look.

And then Seisaku walked onto the roof.
This could become interesting. As expected, he walked up to our gourp and inquired upon our little roof party.
Being that I was the one who knew him best, and the one closest to him, having sat myself a little apart from the rest, I answered.

"Shadow talk. Everyone's got some info and now they're all sharing it and seeing what the get out of it. Im guessing you could join

I gave the groupa look in case there was an obvious sign of dislike.

"Hey everyone, this is Seisaku-san. We met the other day, he sits near me."

And then I added, just to him, in a lower voice.

"I didnt bring anything to the table either, so dont worry."

AKURI SENSEI



The boy tried hard, I'll give him that. As hard as an innocent fifteen year old boy who thinks he's immortal can try.

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"I understand the need to keep these strange things contained and that news of them splashed across the tabloid press could destroy the school’s reputation.”

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We walked down the stairs to the locker area and got our outdoor shoes on.

Then when he was done I went back to him and held his hand again. I held on tight and squeezed. I felt like if we let go now it would all be over, we’d never work out what needed to be worked out.

Then I had an idea. I led him down the steps, looked for traffic outside the school gates, crossed the road, along to the mall and into the café. I sat him down and ordered two sandwiches, two cream buns and a pot of green tea for two.

We sat in silence while lunch arrived.

The waitress finished serving and went away. In the noisy lunchtime café no-one could over-hear us.

“Now this time, tell me. I am sick of you running out or me running out and I’m sick of crying. If you’re going to drop dead of plague tomorrow just tell me. If you hate me and never want to talk to me ever again then tell me. If you love me then tell me that. Just tell me whatever it is and let’s go from there.”

I reached a hand out across the table and put it on his.

“All right?”

I didn’t smile. I just wanted this to move on.

I was reminded forcibly of the previous afternoon: being steered along randomly and ending up at that cafe again. As we left the school grounds, I could feel the shadow disappear, but then when we entered the cafe it was as if something else was attaching itself to me.

It's called guilt.

After having been here only once, it already made me feel like everything was going to go wrong again.

Ah, but everything goes wrong anyway, regardless of where you happen to be.

As a plate of food arrived, I saw it but didn't feel hungry. If anything, I felt sick. But I was determined to do what had to be done. I'd made my decision.

Then she spoke to me. I couldn't take any of it in. It was as if I could no longer comprehend normal speech, now that everything in the world seemed so strange. So I just answered the question I needed to answer.

"The other day... I, er... I found out..." It would seem I couldn't use language any more than I could understand it. I took a deep breath before continuing.

"I have throat cancer. My parents thought I should take time off, but I... I didn't want to. I hoped I wouldn't have to tell anybody about it. And about the shadow: I don't know why it follows me or what it does, but I don't really believe that it's here to help.

"So that's it. I know I was really stupid yesterday, today too. Maybe I was right to run away. Maybe you should have given up on me."

Like you already gave up on yourself?

quote:

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Originally posted by Icchan
"So, Kazuo-san. It must really suck to be Akuri's 'favourite' student, eh? Don't worry, we're all behind you if you need us. Both mentally AND literally."

---

We reached the roof and sat in awkward silence for a few minutes. The boy that had come with Kazuo-san had seated himself apart from us and I felt uncomfortable. I hoped he had not been dragged along because of Kazuo-san. Just then, Icchan broke the silence and called the boy over. It was a rather gruff invitation to join us and he didn't bother to introduce himself to the boy either. Isn't that just like him? I rolled my eyes mentally.

The boy moved closer but did not introduce himself. Not that I blamed him...but still. I looked to Kazuo-san to do that for us. Nothing there either. Boys.

A moment later, another boy joined us and I hoped this wasn't going to be a repeat of what had just happened. There was no need to worry though, as Kazuo-san's friend introduced him right away as Seisaku-san and mentioned we were discussing the Shadows. Following Kazuo-san's introduction, I said, "Hello. My name is Tanaka Mai. Nice to meet you Seisaku-san."

He looked a little lost so I added, "Yes Shadow stuff but you're very welcome to join us. Actually, we've been throwing around the same old ideas around for a while, it might be nice to hear what someone else thinks about this all... I trailed off and looked at the faces around me.

They were all boys. Feeling a bit out of place, I wished Aoi-chi was here. Where was she anyways? Maybe Sadoru-san knew...

This sudden bout of shyness was strange new experience but maybe not that strange. They were all practically strangers after all. It was a relief to see Yuichi's face among the others and giving him a small smile, I went and sat back down next to him, closer than I had been sitting before.

There, I knew that would make me feel better. Enough for me to quickly fill in Seisaku-san about what was going on...which basically meant explaining, we had no idea what these Shadows were, other than healers, and that we were trying to find out more about them. Then, to everyone else, I said, "So, um, the reason we wanted to get together had something to do with the Shadows. Icchan, you still have that note on you? Maybe Kazuo-san, you could explain this better?"

The note...The more I think about, the less sense it makes. Hopefully Kazuo-san can shed some light on it.

Post last edited by fenkashi on 11.03.2007, 06:26 PM.

quote:

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“I have throat cancer…”

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I sat down and nodded and introduced myself to everyone. It was good to know more people than just Maho-san.

I guess there is a communion of souls on shadows, that had a nice ring to it in my head. I still felt apart from what ever this was, but I wouldn't have minded being in the centre of it all. That was what I wanted. I wanted to be the person who had the rules of the world bend around. Ahh... well keep dreaming.